The High Priest's Secret Tomb
by Rune-Sorceress
Summary: Now lost in the middle of a snowstorm, Kaiba and the geek convention seek refuge inside a cave. But considering their luck, the group soon stumble upon a hidden tomb filled with ancient dangers from the past... (Spoilers)
1. Three Chimpanzee Narcissists

**The High Priest's Secret Tomb**

* * *

**Summary:** Now lost in the middle of a snowstorm, Kaiba and the geek convention seek refuge inside a cave. But considering their luck, the group soon stumble upon a hidden tomb filled with ancient dangers from the past...

**Disclaimer:** I do not own **'Yu-Gi-Oh!'** Kazuki Takahashi, Warner Brothers, 4Kids Entertainment, and etc. does.

**Chapter:** Three Chimpanzee Narcissists

* * *

**_A Yu-Gi-Oh! Fanfiction  
By Rune-Sorceress_**

* * *

****

In Domino High School...

"Alright, settle down class!" a teacher shouted over the regular squabble of students whom were trying in vain to settle themselves down on a mundane Monday. "Settle down everyone!" the teacher shouted once again. Startled out of their sluggish trance, all the students quickly sat down.

All was normal in the High School of Domino City.

Focusing their full attention to their teacher, she started, "Good, now let's begin on chapter 27, page 127, for...algebra!" But before the complaints even began, she turned around and said, "I was just kidding."

At this news everyone started cheering loudly, now fully awake and alive. "Yeah, go Ms. Dian!" cried a blonde young man, grinning like a fool.

"But," Ms. Dian interrupted, picking a pile of papers off her desk. "...you will be getting a 'we will be going on a field trip' speech instead."

Louder whoops of hoorays came and went from the students all around, only one person seemed completely out of place among the happy teens. Ms. Dian frowned, causing the others to turn towards the source of the clicking of keyboard pads.

None other than Seto Kaiba.

"Grrr! Rich boy, why not try showing a bit of enthusiasm for once?" Joey growled in annoyance.

Kaiba, not even looking away from his laptop, replied, "Because that's just not my style and besides, field trips are for little kiddies like you, you 3rd rate duelist."

Joey stood up with clenched fists as he shouted, "Oh yeah? How about you stand over here so I can deflate some of that fat ego of yours?"

"Joey, calm down," Yugi whispered, helplessly pulling him down to sit.

"Sit down, Joseph," the teacher ordered and with a huff, the blonde did as he was told. "I'm sorry you feel that way Mr. Kaiba, but it's mandatory by the School District that you go. It's going to be 70 percent of your overall grade for this last semester after all," Ms. Dian stated matter-of-factly.

Kaiba merely rolled his eyes and continued typing.

Then, with a small sigh she continued. "As I was _saying_, we're all going to be going to the Snow Mountain Resort for _two weeks_." Whispers of excitement quickly aroused. "Now, I want a parent or guardian to sign these papers by tomorrow." Ms. Dian handed out the papers from her desk.

Then turning around, she quickly resumed the lesson of the day again. "Mr. Wheeler, please answer the question," the woman called, indicating the blackboard in front of her.

"Huh? Uh, well, let's see..." Joey squinted his eyes while scratching the back of his head. "What does 60a + d/b equal if a equals 2, b equals 2, and d equals 4?" The blonde thought for what seemed like forever, but still came up with nothing.

His teacher shook her head as she irritably said, "If you had paid _any_ attention to the past two week's lessons, Joseph, you would have known how to do this."

"Hehe, who says I don't know?" Joey sweat-dropped and hurriedly shouted, "Um...60abd!"

Every student fell off their seat in shock at Joey's idiotic answer.

"Incorrect." Ms. Dian then turned to Kaiba with a hopeful smile. "Care to correct him, Mr. Kaiba?"

The boy momentarily took his eyes away from his laptop's screen to calculate the equation on the board. "The answer is 122," Kaiba replied.

"Tch, _wrong!_" Joey stated smugly. "How did you come up with that answer? There are letters in the equation after all."

"Actually, the answer was correct," replied his teacher.

The blonde sixteen year old blinked, then began shaking in annoyance. He already knew what Kaiba was thinking and could just picture the expression on the boy's face. But still, Joey turned to glare at the brunette in the far corner of the class.

Kaiba was, as expected, smirking. Clearly gloating in satisfaction that Joey had made a big fool of himself, again. A vein or two were now evident on blonde's head.

* * *

The day seemed to drag on a little longer than usual, not because of a time alternating evil or anything. No, this was much worse. It was the first three periods on the first day of the week and everyone couldn't wait until that little hand landed on twelve. Indicating that it was time for, "LUNCH!"

"Calm down, Joey!" Tea sighed. She honestly didn't see his fascination with food nor did she care to share the experience either.

"But Tea, it's time to eat!" Bakura's british accent rang as he picked up stride with the two  
friends.

"Bring on the food, I'm starving man," Tristan said standing beside them.

"Hey guys..." Duke greeted, staring at Tea as she coughed in indignation. She was clearly advising him to rephrase his greeting. "...and only girl in the group. Sheesh Tea, do you need more girlfriends or what?" he kidded.

Giving him a piercing glare, Tea retorted, "Thanks, but no thanks. I think I have more than enough _girlfriends_ already." The guys around her blinked, but before they could process the insult completely she changed the subject. "Hey, where's Yugi?"

"Over here!" the exuberant spiky headed boy called to them from over at a table.

"Hey Yugi," his friends greeted as they took a seat at the table outside. There was a bright and clear blue sky out that day with a nice breeze adding to the already perfect looking day.

"Hey guys, oh and Tea, hehe," Yugi quickly amended nervously. After he and his friends had settled down and finished with their idle talk of the day before, Yugi decided to give them the big news. "Hey, um, guys...?"

"Hmmm?" they asked, abruptly stopping what they were doing to face the teen. They knew it must be something important. Yugi didn't often have a serious face on unless it was something of immense importance.

"You remember that day, when we set Yami's spirit free, the tomb had collapsed after the duel and the Millennium Items had been buried underground, right?"

"Yeah." Tristan replied, raising an eyebrow. "Why though?"

"Well..." Yugi trailed off as he dug through his book bag and took out...the Millennium Puzzle.

They blinked several times, not believing their eyes, before everyone exclaimed, "WHAT?"

A moment of serene silence descended upon them as they continued to stare at the Item. "How?" Duke finally asked, breaking the silence.

With a shrug, Yugi explained, "Well, it arrived yesterday and it came with a letter from Ishizu. It said," and he took a piece of paper out and read:

_**Dear Yugi,** _

I hope you and your friends are doing well. Now, setting aside the idle chat I have urgent news to give you. This letter is to inform you of the current news here in Egypt, and as you have obviously noticed, I have sent you the Millennium Puzzle. As well as the Rod and the Ring. I only wish for you to keep two of them, but a bit on that later though.

_To begin, the Bureau of Archeology has, most unfortunately, found the tomb quicker than I had anticipated. Luckily my brothers were able to stall for a few days, thus we retrieved all the Items. And now, with Shadi's help, we are currently shipping the Items to their present owners. The Ring goes to you because Priest Mahado in present days is the Dark Magician. But be careful using it around Bakura, I have reason to believe that the evil spirit somehow still resides inside the Item. If not careful, he could break free again._

_If you could be so kind as to do me this favor, I would be most grateful. I want you to give the Rod to Kaiba. I would have sent it to him myself, but knowing the boy, the second he reads it is from Egypt, he will surely throw it away. Please explain the situation to him, though to further explain things to you now is at the moment quite difficult. _

_I have seen nothing nor sensed anything evil arising, but keep on your guard, I know something or someone led those excavators to dig in that area without our knowledge of it. Please take care of your friends and I will contact you when these matters are cleared._

**_Sincerely,  
Ishizu Ishtar_**

_**P.S.** Marik and Odion send their greetings to you and your friends._

"Oookay," Tea whistled, perplexed to say the very least.

"So now what do we do?" Joey asked after a while.

"I don't know, if Ishizu doesn't know what to do, then I'm clueless," Yugi replied worriedly.

"I'll just stay as faraway as possible from that Ring," Bakura piped in, fidgeting at the thought of being possessed by the evil spirit, again. They all subconsciously took a bite of their food, lost in their own thoughts.

"Speak of the evil high priest," Tristan commented sarcastically, rolling his eyes to the strolling Kaiba. It was actually rare to see the CEO out and about during lunch time, for the boy was usually hiding somewhere in the back of the school premises.

Joey shook his fist in the air menacingly. "That jerk embarrassed me in front of everyone in class today!" he muttered through gritted teeth.

Tea only snorted and said, "You did that all on your own. No one told you to burst out with the wrong answer and then yell out that Kaiba got it wrong too, when it was in fact right."

Joey then turned to glare at his friends who were trying to suppress their laughing. "Who's side are you all on anyway?" he demanded. "Hey, you evil high priest! We have something that belongs to you!" the blonde had turned to shout at the impassive Kaiba. "Hey, don't ignore us! You know who you are! Yeah just keep walking moneybags!"

When the boy had finished with his rant, he turned towards his friends...only to see them walking away, embarrassed out of their minds. "Hey!"

Kaiba on the other hand hadn't heard a single thing, for he was too busy listening to his mini radio, which was currently tuned on the News Broadcast Live.

_"In today's news, we are here live in Egypt,"_ said the man on the radio.

'Just my luck, of all the things to be on today, it _had_ to be on Egypt,' Kaiba thought bitterly.

_"...where the Bureau of Archeology has found yet another tomb. Some experts believe it to be a ceremonial sanctuary, probably where many sacrificial rituals were performed. Others believe it to be a battling stage or a praying temple of some sort. Nothing else is available to report on at the moment. The Ishtar family have no comments on the matter and will therefore not allow anyone to further investiga-,"_

Kaiba had clicked the radio off as the bell rang. The only thing he did catch from Joey's rampage was...

"Hey!" Joey shouted as he ran to catch up with his friends.

"Geeks," Kaiba muttered, sending the group a glare as he continued to make his way inside the school building. So other than Joey's outburst, lunch ended rather uneventfully.

* * *

After school, three and a half hours later...

"Okay guys, Kaiba's walking home today and I have everything ready. I practiced what I was going to tell him yesterday, all day, so-," Yugi was interrupted from his explanation.

"Is that why you couldn't come to the Arcade with us?" Joey asked, miffed.

Yugi sweat-dropped and answered, "Yeah, anyway, we just have to keep our cool and you ALL have to be nice." He then turned to Joey with a pleading look on his face as he begged, "Please Joey, please. Whatever you do, don't argue with him or insult him, alright?"

The blonde just waved a dismissive hand and reassured his friend that he wouldn't. "Don't sweat it Yug, mum's the word."

"There he is now," Tea warned. Kaiba ambled down the middle of the park, but took no notice of the six ahead of him, his eyes being too glued to his book and all.

'Must not, promised Yugi, will...not.' Joey's eye began to twitch as he fought to keep his mouth clamped shut.

"Alright now, we'll just walk up to him and calmly explai-," Yugi was yet again cut short on his explanation. He hit his head with the palm of his hand repeatedly as Joey did what he had just promised not to do.

"Hey, bookworm! We need to talk to you!" Joey shouted.

He couldn't help it, he just couldn't. He would have missed a perfectly good chance to insult Kaiba!

"Way to keep a low profile, man!" Tristan yelled, hitting his friend over the head.

"Yeah Joey, what happened to 'mum's the word'?" Tea scolded.

Bakura then began to panic, saying, "He looks awfully angry, I say we run while we still have the chance!" The albino headed boy started for a beeline out of the park, but was held at bay by Duke.

All around poor Yugi, his friends were bickering. He sighed and began to chant a mantra in his head. 'Stay calm Yugi, whatever you do just stay ca-,'

_"Yugi?"_ a voice inquired confusedly.

"Aaaahhhh!" Yugi panicked, looking from side to side and around him until he just completely lost all patience. Running up to Kaiba he shoved the Rod into his hands and said, "Consider it a gift from all of us!" And then he turned and hurriedly shouted, "Run for it!"

Yugi and his friends ran off at the speed of light, leaving a stupefied Kaiba in their track dust.

Looking down at his hands, Kaiba found the Millennium Rod's golden eye staring up at him.

"Ah!" he shouted and dropped it, a clattering echo following.

Three minutes passed as he stared at it in disdain. He might not believe in all the silly hocus-pocus superstition, but that thing still creeped him out. Stooping down to pick the thing up, he quickly tossed it into his book bag. Kaiba was afraid it was maybe contagious and that he might catch something like whatever Marik had caught.

Some great gift.

Picking up the pace, he stuffed his book away as well, not daring to look back. Something or someone was watching him, he could feel it on his back.

* * *

"That...was...close," Bakura panted as the others trailed behind him, equally as tired from the sprint they had taken for the last seven blocks.

"Guys, I think...Yami's...back," Yugi gasped for air, staring at the Puzzle around his neck for a split second.

His friends didn't comprehend what he was talking about though. "I thought we freed big Yugi already," Joey said.

"Hold on, I'll see if I can talk to him. To tell you the truth, I've tried talking to him, but he didn't answer. Hm, go figure," said the spiky headed boy with a small shrug. When he closed his eyes it indicated to his friends that he wouldn't be able to hear them if they tried to talk to him.

This was not a good idea on Yugi's behalf though...

_"Yugi? What happened? I thought I was set free! Am I now stuck in the living forever?"_ Yami shouted in hysteria, making Yugi cringe in pain through the mind link.

'Yami! Calm down, you're hurting my ears!' shouted the short teen.

This abruptly made his counterpart fall silent. _"Sorry,"_ he said, sheepishly scratching the back of his head.

'Okay now,' Yugi sighed, now he was certain that there was something wrong. What or who had the power to bring back a dead spirit that had been set free? This idea troubled Yugi momentarily, but it was soon expelled when he remembered the presence of his old friend. 'Yami!'

It was the Pharaoh's turn to cringe at the loudness of Yugi's enthusiastic greeting. _"Um, yes, I've been standing here for the past ten minutes. Are you feeling alright, Yugi? You look...unwell."_ Yami couldn't quite pinpoint it, his counterpart looked pale as if worried, guilty, and slightly edgy about something. Why though?

The teen laughed, but gave the facade up just as quickly, the spirit would find out sooner or later anyway. He then voiced his worries out. 'Well, it's just that we barely finished giving Kaiba his Rod, and I just have a bad feeling that we shouldn't hav-,' he was, again, interrupted.

_"You gave **Kaiba** the Rod? It's suicide, he'll kill us all!"_ exclaimed the Spirit of the Puzzle, now aware of why Yugi was so worried.

'No, he won't! Remember he doesn't believe in magic?' Yugi defended, but now that he thought of it...maybe that was what had been worrying him.

_"Still,"_ Yami insisted, a look of skepticism crossing his face. The Pharaoh had forgotten for a moment about his crisis.

'Never mind,' the boy drove the subject off course, he couldn't help the coming dread of what he had just done. Somehow he knew nothing good would result from this. He didn't know why, he always wanted Kaiba to embrace his past, but now...maybe it _was_ better left buried in the sands of Egypt. 'Come on, we better get home and we'll catch up over there,' Yugi said cheerfully.

_"Very well,"_ Yami nodded his agreement as he watched Yugi leave the black dream like plane they usually talked in.

Disconnecting from the link, Yugi found his friends standing around him, expectant faces waiting for him to tell them nothing was wrong. But unfortunately for them, everything was wrong. "It's official, something weird is going to happen," Yugi informed.

"I said this once, though I was rudely interrupted, and I'll say it again, why do weird things always happen to us?" Joey asked, turning and scanning the streets and sidewalks.

"Who are you looking for?" Bakura asked, also looking around and trying to catch sight of what Joey was so preoccupied with.

"That brat, Rebecca Hawkins. Last time I said that she popped out of nowhere and-," Joey froze in mid-sentence as an irritatingly squeaky voice called out to them. Technically the voice called out to Yugi, but still, when they called one of them, they addressed them as a group.

"Yugi, everyone!" the squeaky voice called out once more. They sweat-dropped and heaved long exasperated sighs. The small blonde was at the moment in a limo with her grandfather.

"Where are you going?" Tea asked after the leaving limo.

"To the airport for Egypt! I'll call you all when we get there!" Rebecca answered.

"We're going on a field trip soon, we won't be home!" Tea said, even more grateful for the field trip now.

"After then!" she grinned, waving good-bye to them. Everyone waved good-naturedly, although they were thankful she didn't get off the limo.

"Bye Yugi!" she shouted and he face faulted.

Tea only glared daggers at the back of the limo. 'Jealous of a nine year old squirt, pathetic,' reasoned the girl's rational side, though the irrational part only tried to silence it. And they waited until the limo was out of sight before continuing with their conversation.

"Don't do that, Joey!" Tristan scolded, at which his friend sheepishly gave a shrug to.

"So, you'll probably have to fill Yami in on things for now?" Duke asked. The King of Games merely nodded, and after agreeing on this, they all said their good-byes and departed.

* * *

At the Kaiba residence...

"Seto, you're home!" Kaiba's only sibling ran up to the gates to meet his brother halfway.

"Finally," replied the older sibling. Seto Kaiba may be quite athletic, but truth be told, he did not favor walking, hence the limo. "Have they fixed it yet?" he asked hopefully.

"Yup!" Mokuba laughed, glad that at least he knew his brother was normal, even if other people didn't see that. "They said it had to do with the carburetor in the engine that was malfunctioning or something," the raven headed boy explained.

The elder only sighed and ruffled Mokuba's already messy enough hair. And so Kaiba started off their regular routine of exchanges. "How was your day at school?" he asked.

"Same old, same old," Mokuba replied, earning himself a glare. He knew how much his brother hated it when he parroted him. With a short laugh, Mokuba handed his brother a slip. "I have to go camping with my class tomorrow actually."

Kaiba scowled. "You too, huh?" At the smaller boy's questioning look, Kaiba answered, "It's mandatory I go on a field trip to the Snow Mountain Resort." They both entered the mansion as Kaiba handed Mokuba his slip back. "Alright then, go pack up beforehand," advised the eldest sibling, giving his younger brother a small push towards the stairs. Mokuba cheered all the while he traveled to his room.

_'Foolish boy...they will never suspect,'_ a croaky voice whispered, almost as if though they were standing beside the now alone brunette.

Seto was startled and looked up the stairs, but no one was there nor was there anyone behind him. Ascending to the second floor Kaiba heard it again.

_'He will never be strong enough.'_

"Who's there?" the boy inquired, his voice echoing down the empty halls. He was hearing things now. Kaiba felt the eyes boring into his back once more. 'I'm getting paranoid,' he thought and retreated off to his room for the remaining day.

* * *

At the Game Shop...

_"Yugi! Wake up!"_ Yami shouted as loud as possible, almost believing that at this rate Yugi's grandpa might even hear him.

"H-huh?" Yugi groggily sat up and stared at Yami, who was taking deep breaths from all the yelling. 'Yami? What happened? Why are you yelling?' asked the boy with a yawn.

_"I had...been...yelling for...the last...25 minutes!"_ he stated.

'Why?' his counterpart questioned. The spirit looked as if to faint, but instead he helpfully pointed at the small digital clock on the night stand.

Squinting to get a better look, Yugi still didn't get it. 'Hmmm, 7:45, so what if it-, oh no!' Yami shook his head as his counterpart ran around the room like a maniac with a bad hair day. 'I'm late, why didn't you wake me up?' Yugi demanded in panic.

_"Hmph! Your grandpa tried as hard as he could to get you out of bed, but obviously _Joey_ isn't the only one who can sleep through a stampede of elephants!"_ The pharaoh was floating in midair, giving him a knowing nod. Yugi took this moment to glare at him, but the Pharaoh then pointed to the clock again.

Taking the hint, the teen ran downstairs, choked down his food in one gulp and ran for the door. "Bye Grandpa!" Yugi waved to the sweeping old man along the way, who chuckled at his grandson's growing bad habit.

* * *

'Please don't ring, please don't ring!' Yugi managed to reach the gates of the school and run up to his 3rd floor classroom just in time. 'What is it...with...fast sprints...these days...?' he thought, slowly making his way to his seat.

"Hey Yugi," all his friends greeted.

"Hey," was all the boy was able to get out before collapsing in his chair.

Tea glanced at her friend and shook her head, asking, "Woke up late again?" Her answer was a feeble nod from the sleepy boy.

"Alright class," Ms. Dian entered the class and quickly started off the day. "...please hand in your slips from yesterday." Shuffles of paper around the room could be heard before all slips were handed in. "Good, everyone great job. Now I have one last thing to explain before the trip, the rules."

The students' excited faces right away turned gloomy at the sound of the word _rules_. The woman clapped her hands to catch their attention again. "Come on, don't look so mortified kids. I'll make it as fast as possible, alright?" When she received no answer the teacher only continued on to the rules.

"Firstly then, you will all be required to bring a satchel for your clothes _only_. I am being serious when I say that there will be no games, no toys, and no make-up. Nor will there be allowed any _laptops_ or _electronics_ for that matter." Ms. Dian sent a warning glance at Kaiba, who only glared at her with the most loathing glare possible. "Secondly, you will be needing a sturdy backpack for the equipment you will be carrying for the hike. If you don't have one then we will provide it for you."

"And thirdly, you will all be assigned into groups of four, your partners have already been randomly chosen. The matter is not changeable nor are your partners, so don't even start." When she finished her explanation the woman turned around and set off to write some problems down on the board. "We're leaving tomorrow at 6:30 a.m. sharp, so come extra early," she concluded.

Bakura then raised his hand and asked, "Will other classes be going with us?"

"Yes, four other classes, hence the reason you all need to be put into a group of four people. Girls with girls and boys with boys. Just think of it as meeting and making new friends you didn't even know anything about," she said cheerfully. The class groaned, Kaiba scoffed, and the teacher began the her lesson. "Mr. Mutou, please answer question..."

* * *

"Aw man," Joey complained and shouted in outrage, "...we don't get to choose partners!" The boy had thought that he would have been the one to choose his roommates or at least be left on his own.

"Don't worry Joey, it's not like we won't be able to see each other," Tea tried lifting everyone's mood.

"Tea's right," Yugi said. Just a while ago the boy had explained to everyone that Yami would have a new experience, living in the desert all his life and all.

Yami had come out and had asked multiple questions like, "What is this...snow? Is it a game?"

Everyone sweat-dropped. "You'll see," they always told him.

"We still haven't reached Ishizu," said the spiky headed teen anxiously, again worried about who could be so strong as to revive a spirit that was already set free.

"Ah, don't worry," Duke assured his friends. "...just keep your eyes peeled open for anything out of the ordinary. Other than that, enjoy this vacation from school we'll have."

All cheered for their freedom from the _'torture prison,'_ as Joey referred to it.

* * *

6:10 a.m. the next morning...

"Bye squirt, remember what I told you."

"Don't worry Seto, this is what camp is for. To learn self-defense and self-survival," Mokuba said, waving to his brother as he walked towards his school's entrance.

In the limo towards his school, Kaiba sighed. 'Just two more months,' he thought, tapping his fingers on his satchel nervously. 'Then I can completely focus on my work. I doubt this trip will be any good at all.' He had a feeling that this was going to earn him more worries than relief. And so his worries began even before he arrived at school to leave to the field trip.

The thought about how much work he would have to miss in the two week absence that he wasn't at work plagued him to no end.

_'I could not have done it better myself,'_ that voice whispered once more, but the fifteen year old was too busy trying to calculate the amount of work he would have to even notice.

* * *

The front of the school...

"Okay class, listen up, I will be reading out the assigned groups. You will then sit down in two mini groups each on the bus," Ms. Dian said, gathering her class into single file. The students barely nodded though.

"Yugi Mutou... Bakura Ryou... Jake Anderson... and Jimmy Michael..." their teacher called and they sluggishly got onto the bus. "Tea Gardner... Melissa Hima... Lanette Michelle... and Amie Nin..." she called again.

This was how it went until the teacher finally reached the last group. "Well, it's obvious who you four are partnered up to, you're the only ones left!"

"Yeah! Tristan, Duke, we're all partners!" Joey exclaimed happily.

"Alright!" Tristan high fived his best friend.

"Great. But who's the our fourth roommate?" Duke thought to ask and looked about them.

"You're kidding, right? Why am I grouped with the three chimpanzee narcissists?" their fourth roommate shouted. He stormed past the three onto the bus and sat on the left side next to the window.

"Does that answer your question?" Tristan asked while Joey glared, willing the bus to explode.

Duke sighed. "Surprise, surprise. Kaiba's _always_ the party pooper, he had to ruin our vacation somehow."

With that said, the trio entered the bus. Joey sitting to the right side of the bus, Tristan next to him. The reason being that Joey had tried to pummel Kaiba for calling him a chimpanzee narcissist, but he cooled off on his side of the bus afterwards.

So Duke ended up sitting next to the young CEO, annoyed at being insulted as well, but trying his best not to lash out at him.

Ms. Dian sighed, her blonde hair swishing as she shook her head. Grabbing her satchel, she boarded and took her seat in the school bus, and off they went for _two weeks_ as roommates.

* * *

Please send all questions, comments, criticisms to the e-mail address on my bio page. Check my bio for update information. Thank you!

Copyright (C) 2004 by Rune-Sorceress. All rights reserved.


	2. Snowstorm, Seek Shelter

**The High Priest's Secret Tomb****

* * *

**

**Disclaimer:** I do not own **'Yu-Gi-Oh!'** Kazuki Takahashi, Warner Brothers, 4Kids Entertainment, and etc. does.

**Chapter:** Snowstorm, Seek Shelter

* * *

On the bus...

'Just great, it really is my luck. Who would have thought, out of the whole class I would end up with _these_ three losers?' Kaiba inwardly fumed. 'Two weeks! What am I going to do?'

_'You will follow me,'_ the same voice whispered.

'Who...?' Kaiba wondered, but he received no answer, and so he proceeded to glare outside his window. 'I'm already going crazy and it's only been the _first_ hour on the bus!'

Kaiba was quiet for a minute when he mused, 'I still think it would have been a lot better if I had been teamed up with some other group. Even being in Yugi's group would have been much better!'

The teen looked at his watch, recalling that they had four more hours to go before reaching their destination.

"You know Kaiba, you _could_ try and make this easier. I mean come on, _you_ don't want us to bother you and _we_ don't want you to bother us. So how's about we all stop with the bickering for two weeks and we'll get through this alive?" Tristan persuaded.

"Give it up Tristan, Kaiba is as stubborn as a mule. I've already suggested the same idea to him _three_ times!" Duke cried.

Kaiba found the site outside much more interesting than hearing the monkeys talking though.

Four hours passed and Kaiba could now see the lodge in the distance. The snow was coming down gently, but he had checked the weather forecast before leaving only to find out that it was going to worsen later on in the day. Kaiba cringed, the snoring of his three roommates' had gotten on his last nerve.

'Perfect!' he thought as a plan formulated in his head.

Just as the bus made a small turn to the left, Kaiba turned in his seat, his legs up close to his chest. Then with all his strength, thrust his legs towards Duke's side and kicked him out of the seat and into the next one. The seat was currently occupied by the other two annoying ones and so Duke went crashing into them. The sudden crash woke Tristan, but Joey slipped onto the floor before he was awakened. Facing forward again, Kaiba would use that small turn as his excuse if asked for an explanation.

"What happened?" Ms. Dian asked, startled. The woman mentally noted that Kaiba was barely waking up at the crash's noise.

"Ow," Duke groaned in pain. He had hit the other side of the bus's wall, which would now leave a nasty bruise on his left cheek for a day or two. Getting up off the other two, Duke sent a deadly glare in Kaiba's direction. "I felt _someone_ kick me," he informed.

Ms. Dian glanced at Kaiba and shook her head. "Mr. Kaiba just got up, he was asleep when I asked what had happened." She then turned to the three on her right side and said, "It was probably the turn we took, the air does seem to be getting harsher."

Joey, Tristan, and Duke didn't believe this for one-second though. Shifting their gaze back to Kaiba, they were miffed to see him smirking and wagging his index finger in warning. "Look at him, it was his fault!"

Their teacher turned her head...there was Kaiba, acting like the innocent person he was...not. Ms. Dian glared at the other three. "I do not appreciate liars, it was an accident caused by the bus, now please re-seat yourselves," she ordered.

Kaiba was at it once again, mouthing, _'You three are in trouble and I'm not,'_ behind her back.

"Look!" the trio shouted once more, but Kaiba was again feigning innocence, and another glare was directed at them.

"Sit," Ms. Dian repeated herself for the last time and the three finally complied just 5 minutes before exiting.

* * *

Outside the bus...

Kaiba walked towards the lodge, his satchel and backpack in hand. "That was a rotten trick Kaiba," came an angry voice behind him.

He turned to come face to face with three animals he had come to loath to quite an extent. "What do you mean, Devlin?" Kaiba asked casually.

"You were the one who kicked him and pushed him towards us!" Joey barked in his face.

"Mutt, a piece of advice, take a breath mint." Kaiba smirked at Joey's angry red face.

"Look at what you've done, now he's going to blow a gasket!" Tristan bellowed, but the taller boy's response to this was to resume walking to the lodge.

* * *

Not too faraway...

"Oh no, what do you suppose happened over there, Yugi?" Bakura asked, but received no reply in return. "Yugi?" He turned around to see his friend crouched on the ground, gingerly poking the snow.

"This...this is snow? Where is the game?" Yami demanded, causing Bakura to sweat-drop in the background.

Someone then threw a snowball in Yami's direction. "Sorry, Yugi!" called the student who had thrown it.

Yami's eyes widened as he gasped, "This _snow_ is _evil!_ I must banish it to the Shadow Realm!"

"Huh? No, no, no, no, Yami! Yugi and I will explain the games to you, j-just call Yugi back!" Bakura exclaimed, laughing nervously.

The Pharaoh looked skeptically at the white powder then said, "If you're sure..." The other nodded vigorously.

A slight change soon indicated that Yugi was back. "Sorry about that, he got kind of excited and came out, and well..." Yugi trailed off in embarrassment.

"As long as nobody is sent to the Shadow Realm," stated his friend. "Do you think Kaiba and the other three will survive two weeks in the same room?" the boy asked again.

"I bet you ten bucks that they won't," Tea chimed in, now standing beside the two.

"Tea!" Yugi and Bakura shouted in admonishment.

"What?" Tea defended.

Yugi nodded. "I agree too."

"Me three."

* * *

"Get back here, Kaiba!" Joey called, lunging towards the brunette. Kaiba was already inside the lodge's refuge though and merely slammed the door shut in Joey's face. Inside, the walls shook and a dull thud was heard crashing and falling to the ground outside.

"Pathetic," Kaiba scoffed as he walked to the lounge where the room numbers for each group were being given.

"Group number, young man?" queried a tall man with a black mustache, a few gray hairs visible among his black hair.

"Group number nine," Seto informed, trying to place recognition on the man.

"Let's see, classroom number and teacher?"

Kaiba frowned, deep in thought as he steadied his gaze on the man. The man repeated his question and startled the boy out of his reverie. "Huh? Oh, um, room number 256, Ms. Dian," he said.

"Ah, here we are, your room is number 158. On the second floor, just up the stairs to your right when you exit the lounge. Go down four doors to your right afterwards, got that?" asked the man with a smile. His eyes clearly held some knowledge that Kaiba didn't know of, much to the boy's annoyance.

With a nod, Kaiba took the piece of paper being handed to him, and then stormed out of the lounge to the indicated stairs on his right. He knew the guy, but from where? He hated not knowing things, especially things that other people knew about him that he didn't.

Relaxing a bit in the empty hall, Kaiba noted there were three hallways. One to his left, the other in front of him, and the last one to his right. Which way was it again? He hadn't paid any attention to the elder man as he was too busy trying to place a name on him. It was on the second floor, so it couldn't be the hall in front of him, it led to a staircase up to the third floor.

"Down four doors to your right," Kaiba recalled the man's directions and set off to his right. "I bet Wheeler's idiotic behavior is contagious," he muttered, opening the door to his two week room. 'Hmmm, not bad,' he thought to himself.

There were four beds across from him, a night stand to the right of each bed. One bathroom to the far wall left of him, a t.v. to the corner on his right with a table semi in front of it.

Seto walked to the other side of the room and took the bed to the far left of him. It was closest to the bathroom and closest to the balcony, which was a few feet away from the head of his bed. There was a sort of small looking counter blocking his view outside when he sat up. After Kaiba unpacked his clothes into the drawers he set his small briefcase on the bed, one he had to hide from Ms. Dian. "Ha! Being the teacher's pet does come with its own rewards," he said, which in a way was true.

Because his teachers trusted and expected him to do the right thing all the time, Kaiba never got into trouble. He could tease and bully his classmates all he wanted when the teacher wasn't looking, and in the end, if they told on him, _they_ were the ones who got punished. It's, as they say, always the quiet ones that you should watch out for.

"No one is going to tell me I can't bring my electronics with me," Kaiba whispered to himself as he took his cell phone out and dialed a number.

* * *

"That jerk's going to pay," Joey muttered as he and his two roommates trudged up the stairs to their room.

Opening door 158 the trio found Kaiba sitting on his bed, talking to someone on the _phone_. "Remember to behave..., alright see you in two weeks. _If_ I make it out alive," he said and hung up.

Tristan strode to Kaiba's side in a matter of seconds and pointed a shaking finger at his bed. "Caught red handed, huh? What do you have to say to this, Kaiba?" Seto sat on his bed, arms crossed as he raised an eyebrow in question. Tristan huffed and continued, "I thought Ms. Dian said no electronics allowed!" He knew they had Kaiba right where they wanted him, well, maybe not entirely. Kaiba still had their teacher's trust on his side, as he had proven on the bus earlier that day.

Kaiba shrugged, it didn't matter because he had a backup plan already. "You won't tell," he stated with confidence.

At this, the other three smirked evilly, daring him to come up with an excuse. "Oh? Care to tell us why we won't?" they inquired.

"One, I have to take care of Mokuba," Kaiba replied. Joey quickly got teary eyed at the response, always being a sucker for brotherly concern. "...and two, I'll forget about even considering your proposition on the bus if you tell."

This immediately caught everyone's attention. "What? Really, you're considering it?" they asked hopefully.

Kaiba gave them an indecisive sigh, "I don't know. I mean if you're all going to tell on me then there's no reason as to why I should..."

"But if we don't rat on you, you'll agree, right?"

The CEO mulled over this for a while, then he finally said, "Fine."

"Deal!" the trio shouted together once more, happy to see some cooperation from Kaiba at long last.

"Now that that's settled then, let's go celebrate with some food!" Joey cheered and exited the room.

"Hey! We still need to unpack our things!" Duke shouted down the hall, but Joey was too engrossed at the thought of food to hear.

"Hm, we'll unpack later. Let's go before Joey eats everything in the cafeteria," Tristan said, running after his friend. With a defeated shrug, Duke too trailed after the blonde.

Kaiba stood from his bed and grabbed a fresh pair of clothes then headed for the bathroom for a shower.

* * *

In another room...

Outside, the winds were picking up speed and the snow was coming down heavier than before. The storm made it look as if it were night when in fact it was only ten o' clock in the morning. "Now we're stuck inside," Tea complained.

"Weird, I mean the snow was so light before," Melissa added as she continued reading her book. The other two girls in the group were squealing their throats dry as they looked through a magazine.

"Oh cute! I like this dress, but the other one looks fluffier!" Lanette shouted in excitement.

"No, this one does," Amie protested.

"Or maybe this one, oh wait...!" they both shouted together.

Tea inched out from the room until she was out in the hall. Walking down to the cafeteria she bumped into all the guys along the way.

"Guys! Man, am I glad to see you all!" Tea cried in joy. The girl had honestly gotten too used to being one of the 'guys'.

"Hey Tea, how are you and your roommates getting along?" Yugi asked.

"You don't want to know," the girl muttered.

The boys laughed. "Come on Tea, it can't be that bad!" Bakura stated.

Tea gave them a look, they obviously didn't know the horrors of _'girl talk'_. "To put it simply, just imagine Mai's obsession with clothes and times it by twenty."

The five boys sweat-dropped, quickly wanting to change the subject. "Well, you'll be glad to know that we weren't planning on talking about clothes _today_," Tristan commented mockingly.

"Yeah, the subject today is on how Kaiba is actually cooperating with us," Duke informed.

Yugi, Tea, and Bakura sighed, "I lost ten bucks." Their other three friends gave them questioning looks. "Nothing!" they hastily added.

* * *

In the cafeteria...

The cafeteria was filled with the scent of bread and tomato sauce, the main dish being spaghetti that day. Tables were filled with bustling friends here and there as they gossiped about random things. In the far back of the room sat Yugi and his squad, speaking in low voices among the loud chatter around them.

"Well, looks like you guys are going to have peace and quiet after all," Bakura said, his voice sounding a bit disappointed. He and the other two had been hoping for a bit of entertainment these coming two weeks.

Duke rolled his eyes, mumbling, "Yeah, only _after_ I got this really bad bruise on my right arm and face."

"What happened?" Yugi asked, worry washing over the disappointment.

Duke shrugged. "Someone kicked me and the only person that was sitting to my right in the bus was Kaiba. Then I crashed into these two here."

Tea was furious, thinking it wasn't fair that Kaiba was bullying her friends. "Why didn't you tell the teacher?" she demanded.

With a short laugh, Tristan answered, "We did, but let's just say Kaiba should really consider being an actor. See, when we told her, he fooled her with one of those _innocent _faces, which I frankly thought didn't work on people anymore."

Joey nodded knowingly. "Then _we_, the victims here, got scolded for lying!" he shouted.

"Hmmm, he's good," the girl agreed.

"Joey has that big bruise on his face too," the raven headed teen indicated Joey's nose.

"Can't you show Ms. Dian the bruises then?" Bakura interrupted.

"True," Tristan mused, "...but the door was the one who gave Joey the big smack and Duke, well...Ms. Dian already thinks it was an accident."

"And besides," his best friend continued, "...we got him to leave us alone for the remaining two weeks. That's all that counts in my books. For now we'll just sit back and re-, hey!" The blonde snapped back to attention, turning to Tristan with a sour expression. "Why'd you get out of this mess without a scratch?"

Tristan sweat-dropped. "Gee, thanks a lot _pal_, you wanted me to get hurt?"

"No! All I'm saying's that it isn't fair!"

"Oh yeah? I'll show you fair!" The taller teen then grabbed Joey by the neck, seemingly choking him in a friendly manner. The two friends continued bickering, the others not even trying to separate them.

They knew better by now and so just ate their lunch in a sort of peace.

* * *

6 hours later...

Kaiba was having the time of his life, being left alone and all. His eyes scanned through a document when he looked up towards the curtained balcony. The storm was getting worse by the minute, as he had expected.

'Curiosity killed the cat,' his rational side warned tediously.

'Blah, blah, blah,' argued the irrational side.

Now then, which side usually always wins? If you guessed irrational, then you guessed right.

Poking his head from around the counter in front of the head of his bed, Kaiba stared at the two balcony doors. Someone's shadow had been constantly walking back and forth on the balcony for the past hour or so. Kaiba had at first ignored it, reasoning it just being his active imagination. His roommates hadn't been back, except once to unpack, so it couldn't be any of the three.

It had stopped a few minutes ago, but now he couldn't help check. Standing up, Kaiba walked up to the doors and struggled pushing them open because of the wind outside. Succeeding after a moment, Kaiba's sight was greeted by a mass of white snow. A huge tree was located a mere five feet away from the balcony.

'See, nothing happened,' Kaiba's irrational side shouted triumphantly. Looking about the bottom premises though... 'Then what is that?' his rational side stated. He blinked.

This was why Kaiba never listened to the first little voice in his head. Its advice reminded him of something Wheeler might say, which wasn't a good thing in itself.

_'The hike will be perfect...he'll find it...'_

Seto squinted his eyes from the snow and shouted over the railing, "Hey you, by the tree! What on earth are you doing?"

There was a silhouette standing by the tree, just staring up at him. Its long cape, at least that's what it looked like to the boy, swished along with the wind. Kaiba could barely tell if it was a man or a woman. It had long hair, but its figure looked a bit bulky.

Kaiba frowned and stepped back into the warm room, closing the doors and securely locking them tightly. He was creeped out to say the very least. Turning back to his bed he saw a flash of gold burst from underneath his backpack.

'It's that dumb rod,' he thought and grabbed the golden Item, intently staring at the eye. He had brought it onlyto avoidYugi's lectures on how he's supposed to take care of it at all times. For now, he would humor the delusional boy.

* * *

At the tour...

"And this is the 4th floor balcony in the lodge, we don't allow anyone up here. You may say it's like an attic for some special antiquities, so please stay clear of this area. Now, if you'll follow me," the tour guide walked on down the hall.

"Hey guys, did you notice if Kaiba brought the Millennium Rod with him?" Yugi whispered to his friends.

Joey shrugged and said, "No, bet you he didn't, he doesn't believe in this stuff. Though he did bring himself a phone, a laptop, and who knows what else."

The spiky haired teen blinked. "What? I thought Ms. Dian said those things weren't allowed?"

"Yeah, but he said he needed to keep in contact with his brother. You know, just in case there was an emergency," Joey sniffed.

Yugi and the others sweat-dropped.

"And this hall is off-limits at all times, got that? Some say that it's haunted, so for you pranksters, I'd be careful if I were you." Everyone froze. The tour guide only smiled as she motioned down the stairs, saying, "Now let's go, they're serving cocoa tonight."

"Hmmm, they make pretty good hot chocolate drinks here," Duke complimented.

With a nod, Tristan opened the door to their room for the third time that day. Stepping inside the three were surprised to see Kaiba wasn't on his bed, glued to his laptop's screen. Instead he was standing by the balcony doors, clutching a certain golden Rod tightly. The CEO was peeking through a partially open crack of the curtain to the outside.

Each boy raised an eyebrow at this strange behavior.

"Um...isn't spying a bit immature, Kaiba?" Joey asked, but was quickly elbowed on each side. "Right, forgot!" he groaned, clutching his stomach in pain.

Kaiba's steady gaze was then broken. "Huh?" he looked towards the three, who were nervously grinning. Shifting his gaze back outside the figure was long gone now. "Where did it go?" Kaiba opened the doors and searched around.

Nothing turned up so he gave it up and reentered the room once more. Locking the doors he turned his attention back to the three at the doorway. "What are you three staring at?"

"What were you doing...and I thought you didn't believe in the hocus-pocus mumbo-jumbo?" Duke pointed at the glimmering Rod in the teen's hands.

"Why don't you geeks ever mind your own business? No, I don't believe in your little occult stuff so just give it a rest already." The taller brunette sat on his bed with an air of nonchalance.

Joey jumped back a few feet, still wary of the Rod his rival held. "Yeah right. Then why'd you bring that Rod with you?" Joey pointed out. His inquiry was answered when Kaiba snapped the safety sheath off the secret dagger. "Hehe, good enough," he laughed.

"Well, I'm taking a bath," Tristan yawned, breaking the tense silence after a while.

After an hour or so they were each sleepily sitting in bed, watching the television. Choosing what bed who would be sleeping in took the remaining energy out of them.

Who would have thought that a five hour ride on the bus would have taken so much out of them? They weren't even doing anything to tire themselves out, on the contrary, they were sleeping! Waking up at six o' clock in the morning wasn't something they did often, except maybe Kaiba.

As Seto's wristwatch suddenly blinked ten o' clock, he shut his laptop off. He needed to be up early in the morning after all. The other three were already snoring Z's away, a bit too loudly for Kaiba's comfort, who tiredly turned the t.v. off.

'How exactly am I supposed to get any sleep with this racket?' he thought for a moment. Minutes passed as he finally grabbed the Rod, inspired by a thought. 'If Marik _was_ able to possess people in the first place, what's to say it won't work on snoring problems?'

Kaiba didn't really know how to go about this though. Did he just point the thing at them or what? Maybe if he knocked them over the head...

But he tried the mostlogical thing first, concentrating.

After a minute or two of waiting, he was surprised and grateful to see that it had indeed worked. 'What do you know, the geeks were right all along, there is such a thing as magic. Not that I'll ever admit that to them though.'

_'Well done, you are a natural, this should be easy then,'_ a voice echoed in his head, sounding much younger.

"Not again," Kaiba growled, harshly slamming the light switch off and going to bed.

And there was the silhouette again. _'If you will not accept then I have no choice, but to make you. They will die, I will make sure that they finish.'__

* * *

_

A constant beeping was heard as a pair of brown eyes drowsily opened to see what it was that awoke him.

"Yugi," he whispered to no avail and stood to go turn it off himself.

But once he was near enough to turn the thing off, Yugi turned to the other side, taking with him the annoying beeping watch. Going around the bed the boy stumbled over Yugi's backpack and accidentally dropped something along the way. Not looking at what it was, he picked it up and would have put it quickly in the sack, if he hadn't frozen that is.

A bright golden light flashed and slowly subsided.

The pale boy's eyes snapped open, less round and all innocence deprived from their brown hue.

Yami Bakura smirked and stared at his hands, which he was delighted to see were now solid instead of transparent. 'Finally, I am once again freed! Eh? Hmmm, what is that insistent noise?' thought the evil spirit of the Millennium Ring.

The constant beeping was grating on his nerves, the noise was ruining his triumphant and dramatic return to the living. 'Ah, the Pharaoh's vessel...hmmm, but where is that noi-.'

"Mmmm, wha-, oh Bakura? What are you doing all the way over here?" Yugi incoherently mumbled, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

"Huh?" the albino boy looked at his hands. 'What happened? I dropped...something of Yugi's and then...dozed off for a minute there... Must be hungry,' Bakura reasoned.

Just then Bakura's stomach grumbled, blushing he said, "Hungry, hehe, um, actually your watch woke me up and since you looked like you were out cold I was going to turn it off. Sorry I dozed off there, I do that when I'm hungry."

Yugi laughed quietly as to not wake the other two roommates. "No problem." He shut the watch off. "Sorry about that though. Come on let's go and eat some food," the short boy suggested.

His friend nodded his agreement and the two headed out the door.

* * *

Another watch went off, this one was shut off on the second beep though. Yet instead of brown eyes opening they were blue eyes. Getting up he quickly gathered his clothes and torpidly walked to the bathroom for a shower.

'Need coffee afterwards,' Kaiba noted as he fiddled with the shower knobs, he made sure to lock the door.

* * *

"All right class! I assume you're all ready and excited about the hike?" Ms. Dian cheered as she looked upon her class.

"Yeah!" almost all of the class cheered.

"Alright, these here are your instructors, Mr. and Mrs. Haiahashi," their teacher introduced two of her long time friends. A woman with dark red hair and a man with dark brown hair. Both looked kind and patient as they smiled. "They will be going around giving you each two booklets, which you must read. We can't start hiking if you don't know the names to your tools now can we? Now remember to ask us for help if you're stuck somewhere." Ms. Dian nodded to a student raising her hand. "Yes, Ms. Lina?"

"I was wondering," the girl started, "how long do these lessons take before the actual hike?"

Mrs. Haiahashi answered, "It usually takes up to three days, but if you're all fast learners it should only take two days."

"Any more questions? No? Good, begin then."

Everybody sighed. "Studying on vacation? Now that just isn't right," someone complained.

"Yeah, I agree."

_"Yugi, what is this hiking you are all talking about?"_ Yami curiously asked, popping up beside his counterpart. He looked at the place around him with a slight scowl.

'In the snow we like to go climbing those ice mountains over there, see?' Yugi indicated to the icy mountains in the far distance.

_"Those...won't you fall?"_

'Yeah, but that's what the equipment is for, so you can stay securely on the mountain. It'll be my first time, but I have a feeling this will be fun.'

Yami nodded, _"What about those snow wars? Are you not afraid you'll die?" _

Yugi gave him a blank look. 'Huh?'

_"The wars, remember?"_ Yami nagged in exasperation.

The short boy face faulted. 'No! You just throw snow at each other, you don't die!' Yugi stated, flipping his booklet to the next page.

_"Ah, hmmm, in that case I would like to see these snow wars,"_ the spirit nodded, his views on snow taking a turn for the better.

'Maybe after the hike they'll have some activities ready,' Yugi said.

* * *

'Wars...that should be fun,' Yami Bakura mused. He was once again in control and was staring at the snow in disgust. 'What is this...this...thing? It's so white, so good, everything must be shrouded in shadows! Not in this thing called snow!' he mentally fumed. 'It seems I have more work to do than expected.'

"Watch out Bakura!" warned one of his classmates too late.

"What?" Poof, Yami Bakura was hit by a snowball and his reaction was just as similar as Yami's, if not worse. "How dare this snow attack me! It has no right to attack the King of the Shadows!" The student who accidentally hit Yami Bakura ran away, frightened at the usually nice boy's reaction. "I shall send you to the Shadow Re-," the spirit's ranting was stopped as more snow fell onto him from on top of the tree he was standing under.

He looked like an innocent snowman...with evil glaring eyes that is.

* * *

Kaiba long ago finished reading his booklets and was now taking his _own_ tour around the lodge. Going up to the 4th floor he looked down two halls opposite of each other. 'Which to choose...?' he wondered.

Deciding on the left side, Kaiba walked slowly, taking as long as he wanted. He came to a stop and opened the door in front of him. Only to be greeted by..._himself_. "Ah!" Kaiba shut the door with a yelp, then sighed. 'Sheesh! What else did you expect? I think I've been around Yugi and his convention for far too long,' he inwardly scoffed. Deciding that going to his right would be better he found yet another door. Opening it slightly ajar, Kaiba found an attic like room with a huge balcony across from him.

"Much better." He stepped inside and took brief glances at the different antiques, mentally noting that they were all of rare quality and priceless. Making his way towards the balcony, he viewed over the back and right side of the premises below. Kaiba could see Yugi still reading his booklets by some tree, while on the other side of the premises he caught a glimpse of Bakura throwing the snow...into some black portal?

"Too many balconies in this lodge," Kaiba muttered.

Exiting, he continued down the hall, coming to an intersection he found a hall with a sign saying, 'Do not pass', but he passed. It was much darker in this hall than the others.

"They really need to take these lamps and fix them."

An extra pair of footsteps were heard walking behind him, but when he turned Seto saw no one, he was the only person up there. To be quite frank, Kaiba was getting annoyed, haunted halls and talking enigmas in his head were getting on his last nerve. So he turned back to leave, saying, "This trip is getting more stressful than relaxing."

The brunette paused at a clattering from behind him. "Now what?" Looking around he found the Millennium Rod. "I should just throw that piece of junk away over the mountain. Hmmm..., maybe that's what I'll do," he smirked, picking it up and tossing it from hand to hand.

* * *

Two days later...

"Come on everyone, we just need to climb this hill to get to the top," Mr. Haiahashi cheered.

"Mr. Haiahashi, can't we take those skiing carrier things to go up?" a student whined.

"But then what's the sport in the _climbing_ if we don't do it this way?"

"I'm tired!"

Ms. Dian smiled, "Consider this a warm-up before the real exercise."

Some groaned, muttering that this was a torture vacation not a relaxing vacation. The backpacks were heavy with equipment, they woke up at 6:00 a.m., of course they had a lot to eat for energy, but still. And the snow was not helping, it seemed to get deeper the more they traveled up, just to spite them.

"Are we there yet?" Joey asked for the tenth time that hour.

"For the last time Joseph, no!" shouted his teacher.

A moment of silence...

"How about now?" Joey tried his luck again.

"No!" yelled all his classmates.

'Yami, I couldn't find the Ring. Do you think that Bakura could have it?' Yugi questioned while trying to pay attention as he climbed steep ice rocks.

_"I don't know...he has been acting strangely for the last two days,"_ Yami stated.

'Wait... Two days ago, when my watch started beeping..., I found Bakura next to my bed. That's where I left the Ring, in my backpack!' Yugi had tripped, forgetting all about paying attention to what he was doing.

_"Oh no, he must have accidentally found it."_ The spirit turned to stare at the albino headed boy, who was now helping Yugi stand at the moment.

Bakura laughed and said, "Come on, I'll help you climb while you talk to Yami." He held his friend steady and pushed him ahead of himself.

With a grateful nod, the short boy blanked out again. 'Hmmm, I don't know, Yami. He seems to be like his regular self...'

The Pharaoh shook his head though. _"That's what we thought last time, remember? Looks can be very deceiving, you of all people should know that by now."_

'But,' Yugi tried to defend, but gave up in the end. He knew Yami was right, no matter how much he wanted to believe it wasn't true. 'Well, when we were in the cafeteria he did say he dropped something from my backpack, though he didn't see what it was. Then the others came...oh, and he dozed off too.'

_"Yes, the evil spirit is back... What are we going to do now?"_

'We'll just have to wait I guess,' Yugi groaned.

* * *

2 hours later...

"We...made...it," Tea huffed.

"Ye...ah!" Joey said proudly.

"Wasn't that fun everyone?" Mr. Haiahashi asked.

"Wo-oho-o!" someone replied sarcastically.

The three adults sweat-dropped. All, but one, students were on the ground panting. Kaiba was a few feet from the rest of the group, looking bored. Something gold shimmered on his belt behind him. They were semi halfway at the top now, yet had a long way to go still.

"Let's rest for a bit and then we'll get going," Mrs. Haiahashi told the class, much to their relief. Ten or twenty minutes passed by before their small break was over and they continued walking, climbing a few more hills of ice.

Kaiba smiled, this was the perfect height to throw the Rod away on. Now all he needed to do was find a cliff to drop it over.

"Okay kids, it'd be best if you'd get into teams of four with your roommates." Everyone shuffled around as they looked for their teams. "The snow is getting a little deep, not too heavy, so just hold hands," Mrs. Haiahashi ordered.

Joey and his friends locked hands, Kaiba being the only one who had a problem with this. "Kaiba, come on! Grab my hand!" Joey complained.

Kaiba turned his head to the side and scoffed, "Yeah right."

Tristan then butted in. "We don't have time for this man, here then, hold one of our hands if not Joey's." But Kaiba, as stubborn as he is, stood his ground and crossed his arms to make his point clear. "Come on!"

"No."

They sighed, not understanding how anyone could call him _mature_. He was acting like a five year old with a bad case of the tantrums. "Fine, suit yourself. See if we care when you get lost," Joey replied and the trio stalked off, leaving Kaiba to walk behind them.

* * *

Half an hour later...

"The storm is getting a little gusty, maybe we should go back," Ms. Dian chattered, the cold was getting to everyone.

"Yeah, let's huddle the kids up then."

A second later the female instructor started shouting orders. "Alright everyone, don't worry, we've been in worse storms than this before. Now the first rule is, stay together. Don't separate for one-second."

Her long red hair was being tossed all over the place as she had to raise her voice a bit louder to be heard over the howling wind. Some students, mainly being girls, were crying and sobbing. "Second rule!" continued her husband, "Keep heading in that direction, north! You all have compasses just in case you get lost! You won't if we stay together!"

Ms. Dian then added a few words of advice and encouragement. "Be careful using the equipment when going down the hills! Unfortunately we can't avoid them! Stay calm, crying won't help, and remember you'll be safe and warm once you're back at the lodge!"

And so the everyone started towards the opposite direction, freezing cold, scared, and tired. Yami Bakura chose this moment to takeover, suddenly letting go of the student holding his hand.

"Huh? What are you doing, Bakura?" Jimmy asked in confusion. He abruptly regretted saying anything at all as he cowered away at the maniacal glint in his roommate's eyes.

"Mind your own business boy, and a word of advice? One word of this to Yugi and you'll be sorry," Yami Bakura hissed quietly so only Jimmy could hear him.

The boy only nodded and continued walking in silence, looking back to see Bakura was heading opposite of them.

"Hey, Jimmy? Where's Bakura?" Yugi questioned after noticing that his friend was no longer behind them.

Hesitating for a fraction of a second, Jimmy soon blurted, "He went that way! He...um, seemed pretty mad so I left h-him alone, sorry."

The spiky haired boy's worries were now proven true, the other Bakura was back. "It's alright, I'll go look for him," he said, connecting the boy's hand with their other roommate's hand. Jake turned to see what the commotion was about at this action.

"What are you doing, Yugi? The teacher said not to separate!" Jake exclaimed.

The teen zipped his mouth shut with his thumb and index finger. "Not a word to Ms. Dian, okay? I'll be back as soon as possible!" With that said and done, Yugi stalked after Yami Bakura.

* * *

Kaiba was struggling, but he was getting by on his own. Everything was going smoothly...that is until the Rod slipped off his belt somewhere along the way. He walked on for five minutes without noticing this, but when he did...

The teen was soon on his hands and knees, frantically searching and digging through the snow for his lost Item. True he wanted to get rid of the thing, but he wanted to do it himself. Kaiba crawled along the ground muttering, "Rod thinks it can get away from me, huh? Well, too bad, because it's not escaping its fate that easily!" Moments later Kaiba spotted a golden glimmer among the hazy white.

Roughly stuffing the Rod in his backpack, Kaiba stood up and turned around, but no one was there. "Great going, now you're lost," he scolded. The boy wasn't entirely sure which way he had come from, seeing as he took many turns around the place. In truth he could be facing any direction at this point.

Seto then recalled that no one had given him a compass, as they were all out by then. Some instructor had told him to stay close to someone who did have one though, namely a friend or a roommate. That, of course, was impossible, for Kaiba had no friends and there was no way on earth that he was asking one of the _geeks_ for help. He would rather die.

Yelling out didn't do any good either, the wind just drowned him out. "I'm lost in the middle of a storm, _peachy_," Kaiba laughed. In the end the boy ended up walking in the direction he _guessed_ was north.

* * *

Tea was in the back of her line when she caught sight of a figure leaving his group. "Hey, hold on girls!" Her roommates stopped and turned to face her, a bit apprehensive. "I saw Yugi going the wrong way and so I'm just going to get him back! Don't worry, I'll be back soon!" Tea quickly added at the girls' stricken faces.

"If you're sure!" Amie said, reluctantly letting go of her hand.

With a curt nod, Tea turned to leave in the last direction she saw Yugi. "Yugi," she called, "...where are you?"

"Tea?" the boy's voice echoed distantly.

There, a few feet away, she saw him and ran towards the teen. "What are you doing? The lodge is that way!" she informed.

"The evil Bakura is back and he went this way!"

Tea seemed shocked at first, but her expression changed to that of understanding. Bakura had been a little _hostile_ and _aloof_ towards them for the past two days. She nodded and added, "I'll help then!" Yugi smiled, slightly worried she might get hurt, but nonetheless relieved with her helping hand, and they continued walking south.

* * *

Duke on the other hand was walking when he looked over his shoulder, checking to see how Kaiba was doing so far. But when no trace of the teen was found, Duke worriedly shouted, "Hey guys?"

"What?" Joey asked, preoccupied with not tripping over mounts of snow.

"Did you see if he bypassed us?" Duke questioned, his black ponytail blowing in front of his eyes.

"What? No, he hasn't, why though?" Tristan asked.

"Kaiba's not behind us anymore, that's why!" he replied.

"I knew it! Dumb moneybags, we told him to stay close, but does he ever listen? No!" Joey said crossly.

"Come on, we should tell one of the teachers!" Tristan stated, getting ready to go to either Ms. Dian or an instructor up ahead.

"Hold on! If we tell them he's missing we'll get into trouble! So _we_ should go look for him!" Duke informed them.

"But...!" Joey complained and stomped his foot on the ground. He then growled, "Fine, let's go back and look for him! But I promise, if he's actually in front of us and we're over here looking for him, I'll pummel him!"

With this little speech said, the trio grudgingly backtracked for their roommate as well.

* * *

Please send all questions, comments, criticisms to the e-mail address on my bio page. Check my bio for update information. Thank you!

Copyright (C) 2004 by Rune-Sorceress. All rights reserved.


	3. Creepy Corridors

**The High Priest's Secret Tomb**

* * *

**Disclaimer:** I do not own **'Yu-Gi-Oh!'** Kazuki Takahashi, Warner Brothers, 4Kids Entertainment, and etc. does.

**Chapter:** Creepy Corridors

* * *

A boy with hair as white as the snow walked through the frigid snowstorm, the hectic air blowing him back with an unrelenting force. "Where is it?" Yami Bakura growled angrily. "I know that fool of a high priest said it was somewhere around here!"

He staggered on, finding nothing of the likes which looked like an entrance. The next second his Millennium Ring trackers activated, pointing behind him.

"Hmmm? Ugh, the _Pharaoh_ and his little _girlfriend_, Tea!" he sneered. Yami Bakura was not in any mood for a Shadow Game at the moment so instead retreated to the refuge of his Item. Bakura was released as he fell to his knees in exhaustion.

"Bakura!" Yugi and Tea cried in worry, running up to him. "Are you alright?"

* * *

"Kaiba! Kaiba, where are you?" Tristan called.

"This isn't funny anymore, rich boy, so come out already!" Joey shouted.

Duke shook his head and sighed, "This is useless, he'll never hear us with all this wind!"

"Hey look, it's the others!" Tristan said as he spotted sight of his friends to their far left.

"What are they doing back here?" they wondered and headed over to them.

* * *

The other three turned at the sound of their names being shouted, only to find the rest of their group. The same question crossed their minds, what were they doing here?

But Joey beat them to it. "What do you think you're doing here? Our class is all the way over...um...," the blonde trailed off, not really knowing which direction they were facing.

Tristan gave the teen an irritated glance and said, "It's still the same way from where we had come from!" He was pointing to their left since they were standing sideways now.

"Oh yeah, that's right, hehe!"

Yugi would have been amused under other circumstances, but this was not the time. "The evil spirit is back!" he blurted, at which the bickering duo quieted down.

"So, what are you three doing here...and where's Kaiba?" Tea asked, banishing the gloomy silence.

Duke shrugged, informing, "Your guess is as good as ours! We're kind of...looking for him at the moment!"

Tea sweat-dropped. "So he's lost now? Are you sure he's not playing some trick on you three? Because I think even _Kaiba_, of all people, knows how to use a compass!" the girl stated.

"Maybe he isn't as smart as he says he is!" Joey laughed.

"Joey!" everyone scolded.

"What?"

Tristan sighed, "Kaiba was behind us and we would have seen him pass us if he were ahead of us, but we didn't! So we're _guessing_ he went in this direction!"

"Well then, let's get going!" Yugi said, automatically offering his help. Bakura also agreed just as quickly. It took some persuading to get Tea to believe Kaiba was _really_ in need of help, but she went along with them in the end. Yet again, they set off to traveling southward.

* * *

"Okay, guess this was the wrong way," Kaiba muttered, looking around, yet finding nothing other than white blurry landscape. He subconsciously tightened his jacket around himself.

Kaiba wasn't having much luck either.

'This is hopeless...,' he thought crestfallen as he shivered, his hair now damp and untidy from all the harsh wind. Then he thought, 'How could I have forgotten? The best place to seek refuge would _obviously_ be a cave. Yup, now I'm positive the mutt's idioticy _is_ contagious. Glad Mokuba decided to go camping after all.'

"Alright then, let's see," Seto looked around, but found nothing of the likes which looked like a mountain. A few minutes of walking around in circles also proved to be quite useless. "Well, seeing as I can't make this any worse, I'll just go in a different direction. Then maybe I'll bump into a mountain and find shelter." And with that in mind he turned to his right and walked on for what seemed like _hours_.

He was beginning to doze off here and there and so his eyes were fixedly staring at the ground, which in turn caused him to bump into something hard. "Ow!"

What do you know, a mountain stopped him dead in his tracks. "When I said, bump into a mountain, I didn't mean _literally!_" he groaned. "That's going to hurt tomorrow..., okay." Kaiba sighed, now he just had to climb, and so set his backpack down toget the necessary equipment ready.

* * *

Meanwhile, Yugi and his friends were huddled together. "Still no sign of Kaiba!" Tristan shouted, equally close to Joey from exploding.

Duke then asked, "Hey Bakura, doesn't that Ring of yours track down other Millennium Items?"

"Uh yeah...I think!" the other replied uncertainly.

"Well, it turns out that Kaiba did bring the Rod with him! So I thought that maybe we could find him that way!"

"Great idea!" Bakura said and touched his neck, only to remember that the Ring wasn't there. "Um...except the thing tends to disappear when I'm not possessed, hehe!"

Everyone face faulted. "I'm hungry!" he cried, clutching his stomach.

"Now that you mention it!" Joey joined in.

Tea couldn't believe the two were more preoccupied with food, they were the ones who had convinced her that Kaiba was in trouble to begin with. "Listen, the sooner we find Mr. Big Shot the sooner we go back to the lodge!" she stated.

Yugi protested against that though. "We're going to need to find shelter!"

Joey looked to their left. "Hey, how about those mountains over there? We might find a cave or something the teachers are always yapping about!" he said matter-of-factly.

Reaching the foot of the mountain they each took a good look up at the high mountain wall.

Taking more than twenty minutes to climb to the top and forcing themselves to walk around to find _something,_ they finally cheered happily, "There!"

Running to the cave, all six heaved their heavy loads off and set to work, quickly covering the entrance with snow so they wouldn't freeze to death at night.

* * *

"Done!"

Seto dropped the last chunk of snow onto the cave's entrance then proceeded to heavily drop himself onto the snow.

Having already found a cave of his own and having sealed it off from the outside, Kaiba stayed silent. Taking a moment to relax and enjoy the peace and quiet, he suddenly snapped back to reality. Now that he was safe, Kaiba had no idea of what to do next.

"The class won't even notice I'm missing until a week later, if at all. Plus, I only have four days' worth of food, at the least," he mumbled.

Grabbing the cell phone he had brought, he dialed a number only to hear static on the other end.

With a huff, he sat and glared at his backpack full of equipment. Seto then decided to double check through his things as a pass time.

He had: two foldable grappling hooks, three ropes, a flashlight, a bottle of water, a first aid kit, a mini bag full of food, a video camera plus a cell phone, which he secretly stashed away, and his Rod.

'Everything, but the one important thing, a _compass_,' Kaiba thought bitterly, repacking the things away.

* * *

Elsewhere...

"Only four days' food?" Bakura asked, dismayed to say the least.

"Yup," Tea sighed.

All six friends looked miserable and tired. "It's four o' clock," Yugi informed out of habit as he stared at his watch.

"Maybe we should get some rest for now," Joey suggested, for once giving some good advice. Agreeing, everyone made room for each other, although stayed close enough to keep warm.

The wind outside indicated that the storm wouldn't led up for another few days, but somehow finding sleep they slept relatively warm. Yami kept watch during their slumber, just in case the thief tried anything funny. Being asleep for most of the day had its advantages after all.

The Pharaoh frowned, he could sense something foreboding. 'And it amazingly has nothing to do with the Ring, but..._who_...?'

* * *

Maybe Kaiba was less fortunate, he did have no friends to keep him company, nothing to keep him warm. On the other hand, maybe not, because looking closely, some could see there was a strand of white on his face.

For Yami wasn't the only one keeping watch over his charge. Someone else had a duty they assigned themselves to as well.

That strand of white was emitting heat for the cave, keeping the occupant from freezing. The strand traveled up to more strands of white, which were locked to something with glowing vivid blue orbs...

* * *

The occupants in both caves were rudely awakened as a strong rumble shook the caves, and to their horror and dismay found the place collapsing.

"What on earth?"

The ground beneath them grew tiny cracks and the snow was caving in on them. Then, just as it looked like the so called earthquake had stopped, they relaxed, _slightly_, but everyone tensed once more. Bracing themselves for anything.

* * *

Joey screeched after nearly being flattened like a pancake by a chunk of falling ice.

"Uh...hehe...I don't suppose that's a good thing...right?" Tea asked, pointing at a corner in the far left side of the cave.

Everyone stopped moving in order to observe the snow tumbling into the black pit. Then hurriedly, they all ran to the opposite corner as to not fall through the expanding hole.

_"Yugi! What's happening?_" Yami asked in shock. He had been keeping close vigil, how could he have let this pass his senses?

'If I knew, I wouldn't be yelling my head off!' shouted his counterpart.

"Oh boy, we're going to fall!" Tristan warned as the ground began tilting them towards the hole they were desperately trying to avoid, to no avail.

They were heading for the abyss when, "Ladies first!" Joey stated,being the gentleman he is. He pulled Tea in front of him, but the girl swiftly grabbed him by the ear.

"_Chickens_ first!" Tea offered,being the lady she is. And they slipped into the slide like tunnel, traveling to the almost never ending bottom.

* * *

"What now?" Kaiba asked no one in particular.

Spotting the Rod, Kaiba made a dive for it and barely managed to grab it as a cube of ice fell.

On the other side of the cave, nearest to the left wall, an expanding hole awaited to swallow Kaiba up as he grabbed his backpack andran to the other side of the cave.

The entrance was blocked by the falling rocks now and the ground began to tilt him towards the abyss. Although he did manage to grab a hold of the edge of the hole, the snow forcibly pushed him in.

Now both caves and holes were buried in the avalanche of snow and ice.

* * *

"Ooof!" Kaiba hit a stone ground, covered with melting snow, with a loud echoing thud. "_That_...will definitely...leave a bruise," he huffed, small debris of snow falling on his head from above. The teen rolled onto his back and dazedly looked up at the ceiling. It was completely sealed in.

"Mmmm...agh!" Kaiba winced as he got up to a sitting position, his right leg had a long gash, not too deep to prove fatal though. He reached over to his backpack and, taking the first aid kit out, bandaged his leg up.

Rummaging through his backpack, the Rod securely in his belt, he found the flashlight.

Looking around for the first time, he found himself in a nearly pitch black corridor. If it weren't for the torches of fire here and there on the stone walls it would have looked like a replica of the Shadow Realm.

He could hear distant echoes of water dripping down the creepy corridors and he shivered, his breath visible as cold white fog.

Sucking in a deep breath, Kaiba calmed himself down and slowly stood. The searing pain shot up his leg, but he ignored it and looked up and down the two different halls. Turning towards his right, he slipped on his backpack, turned the flashlight on, and limped up the corridor he was facing.

* * *

Somewhere else in the same place...

"Everyone...get...off!" the blonde yelled and shook his friends off his back.

The boy's four friends quickly shuffled around and stood to let him breathe. As he dusted his hair Yugi looked around, asking, "Where are we?"

"Well," Tea said, studying the three dark corridors in front of her while the guys helped a crippled Joey stand. "...a tomb of some sort?" she supplied.

"I knew it! Another creepy weird adventure back to the Egyptian tombs!" Joey piped in, now magically healed.

"Uh, right, small problem... The Egyptians lived in the desert not the snow," Duke pointed out to the oblivious boy.

"Oh yeah huh, I knew that," he countered lamely.

_"Look Yugi, an Egyptian symbol,"_ Yami pointed to the wall next to Yugi.

'Oh, but here? In the Snow Mountain Resort?' Yugi thought.

The lit torches on the stone halls bounced off an eerie orange glow as they each discovered the wall was carved with more than one symbol.

All was still and uncomfortably quiet now.

"How are we supposed to find Kaiba down _here_, if he's up _there?" _Tristan questioned, pointing above to the hole that was sealed off as well.

"We'll need to find another exit first," Yugi stated, deciding on which of the three halls to go through first. "...and we have to be careful. Grandpa got his leg sprained because of a tomb's trap in an excavation once."

Silently agreeing that since Yugi had more knowledge of tombs because of his grandpa and the spirit friend of his, Yami, they would not argue with him on the matter.

"Let's go down this one," he pointed down the middle corridor.

Joey grinned broadly. "Yeah Yug, bet you have like a sixth sense for these things or something, huh?"

The spiky headed boy sweat-dropped. "I just guessed actually." All else face faulted, their hopes in Yugi getting them out evaporating quickly.

Tea then asked the inevitable question. "Where's Bakura?"

Silence met her inquiry.

Everyone looked around. "Okay everybody, stay _calm_. _Just_ because there's an evil psychopath, who has one of our friends hostage, running around in dark unknown territory, _doesn't_ mean we have to panic," Joey said quite helpfully.

"Joey? Shut up," Tristan voiced out in annoyance.

* * *

"So this is where that fool hid it." Yami Bakura silently prowled a dark chamber. "Let's see, what was he always jabbering about? A chamber with mirrors? Oh yes, that was what he said. Now...to find it."

Just then his Ring's pointers directed him to a hall to his left and the thief exited the empty dome like room he was in. 'A Millennium Item down here? But the Pharaoh's Puzzle is the only one here. Yet he and his friends are down the other hall,' Yami Bakura thought.

Coming to a narrow hall he noticed that there was an inch of water splashing his feet. Drips of water echoing somewhere in the distance.

The albino then noticed something on a small mount of snow that had yet to melt. "Hmmm, blood...there is someone else down here who decided to join the party as well."

The thief smirked. 'Perfect, another item for my collection,' he thought and stalked after his prey.

* * *

Please send all questions, comments, criticisms to the e-mail address on my bio page. Check my bio for update information. Thank you!

Copyright (C) 2004 by Rune-Sorceress. All rights reserved.


	4. Moving Chambers

**The High Priest's Secret Tomb**

* * *

**Disclaimer:** I do not own **'Yu-Gi-Oh!'** Kazuki Takahashi, Warner Brothers, 4Kids Entertainment, and etc. does.

**Chapter:** Moving Chambers

* * *

'Forty nine...fifty...fifty one...fifty-two...and fifty-three!'

"Finally!" Kaiba collapsed in a heap at the top of the stairs. He had just climbed three staircases of fifty-three steps each and he was extremely exhausted. Having an already wounded leg didn't help the case either.

Panting and crawling over to a wall he found yet another pair of stairs going in two different directions that needed climbing.

"Whoever made...this tomb..._really_ liked...walking..." Kaiba huffed, looking over the edge of the elevated floor and trying to find the bottom. It was no longer visible because of the dark even with the flashlight.

Decorations of jackal and eagle headed men in beautiful vivid paints performing a sacrificial ritual were carved perfectly into the stone walls. Stones of lapis lazuli were imprinted on the stone steps and walls as decorations for the honor of the royal.

Though Kaiba didn't really notice or care for any of this. Using the wall as a support he stood and continued ascending up the endless stairs to his right.

'One...two...thre-,' the boy's counting was cut short at the sound of scraping on the stone floor. Quickly turning around he caught barely a small glimpse of something black scurrying down and under the staircase.

"Must be a bat or something." And he continued with his game of 'count the steps as you go'.

* * *

You would have thought that Yami Bakura, being uninjured would go extremely fast and Kaiba having a wounded leg would go extremely slow, would have caught up with Kaiba by now.

Yet the Millennium Ring seemed to be having difficulty locating the Rod. Because every time Yami Bakura looked down at his Item while walking he would bump straight into a wall.

"Useless piece of trash! Work _correctly_ already!" he yelled at the pendant. "Ugh, fine! I'll find the Item on my own then!"

He was back to where he had started from, in the big dome like chamber. Empty and cold as it was before he had left it on his wild goose chase for the mysterious Item. "No, it's the other way," he muttered.

He turned to the chamber he had just come from, but to his utter confusion and shock it was not the same room he had walked through.

"Is this some kind of joke?" he exclaimed, storming through and taking a look around for anyone or anything.

This room had a small stairway to the bottom level of the room, a huge golden throne sat at the head of the chamber.

The throne looking big enough for one of the two towering armored Anubis statues on either side of it. Their steel spears were held up menacingly, almost warning any intruder not to further trespass. The Ring then pointed to his right, but when the thief walked in that direction he was met with a wall.

Yami Bakura grit his teeth in annoyance and walked back to the entrance, meaning to enter the dome like chamber. But no, a different room greeted his sight.

People going insane while in the tomb were at a high probability, especially those whose patience were at the lowest of low levels.

* * *

"Find any exit yet, Yug?" Joey asked boredly.

"No," Yugi sighed equally as bored.

"Oooh! We've been walking for who knows how long!" Joey burst, pulling at his hair.

Duke paid no attention to his friend, seeing as the boy had done this three times for the past twenty minutes. Wandering over to an entrance to his left he said, "Maybe this room has an exit."

Tristan held his evil laugh in as he snuck up behind the unsuspecting teen. It was time for a little pay back. "Watch out Duke! There's a scorpion behind you!" he warned in mock terror.

"What? Where?" Duke asked in panic as he jumped and dusted himself off from nothing.

The taller boy laughed his head off. "Whoo boy! Wait until I tell Serenity that you sound like a little girl when you yell! She'll crack up!" Tristan sighed, "I crack myself up."

"I'm warning you, you better not!" Duke threatened.

"What are you going to do? Put me in a dog suite or something?" Tristan mocked. "Oh no! Please don't throw one of your dice at me!"

"That's it, you're going to get it!" Duke shouted and chased Tristan into the nearby chamber.

Meanwhile, Yugi and Tea were inside another chamber looking at the carvings on the walls. They were so awed at the beauty around them that they didn't even notice when the chamber's exit momentarily flashed black.

Joey on the other hand was left in the corridor on his own, muttering to himself. "This is all Kaiba's fault! Oh how when I get my hands on his neck, I'll strangle him slowly! Mwahahaha! Gaahhh! My flashlight ran out of batteries!"

Everything was pitch black for a second or two before his flashlight came back to life.

"Phew! Hey guys, any of you got extra batteries you can lend me?" asked the blonde. His breathing was the only sound that echoed around him. "Hmmm? Yugi, Tea?"

No reply was given.

"Tristan, Duke?"

Still, no one answered.

Then he panicked as something scratched the wall and scurried down the hall. "Bakura?"

Silence...

* * *

"Come on Yugi, we can't stay here all day. We'll never find an exit this way," Tea said, turning towards the hall entrance.

"Yeah, guess you're right. Let's go and see why the guys are so abnormally quiet."

Laughing as they made their way to the hall, the duo fell dead silent. This was not the hall they were in before.

Tea raised an eyebrow. "You guys, where are you? Come out already, we don't need anyone else getting lost!" she shouted. A distant dripping of water was her only reply. "Where are those three jokers?"

"Tea, something isn't right in this tomb," Yugi stated worriedly. Pulling her down to their left, both frantically searched for the missing group.

* * *

"Not the hair man!" Tristan complained, smoothing his hair back in place.

Duke tried swiping at it again, but gave up after a while. "Whatever, let's go back and see if the others found anything yet."

Whistling, the two friends strolled over to their supposed destination.

"Uh oh," Duke muttered.

"What do you mean, 'Uh oh', genius?" Tristan asked, shoving past the teen.

"Uh oh...we're lost is what." They had stepped into a completely different room with never ending looking stairs to the top.

"Great going, you got us lost!" exclaimed the raven headed boy.

"_I_ got us lost? You were the one chasing me!" Tristan countered.

"Well, you started it!"

* * *

"Oh goody, something different for a change." Kaiba rolled his eyes. Having finished climbing the stairs was a relief, but that didn't change the way he felt about the whole ordeal. Now he was in a room with aisles lined with pillars.

Taking the video camera out, the brunette recorded as much of the room's interior as possible. His brother seemed to be obsessed with all things related to Egypt for the past month, so this would make a nice souvenir for him.

This grated on Kaiba's nerves to no end, but he knew it wasn't his brother's fault. It was _theirs_.

Hieroglyphic carvings were written up and down the many pillars scattered around. Torches lit up a few parts of the chamber, so he gave the flashlight a momentary rest.

It was times like these that Kaiba was actually grateful that he could read the Ancient Egyptian language.

"Twelve mirrored chamber? Hm, these must be directions through this...tomb." Kaiba scanned through the writing before sighing. "No, of course not. Nothing is ever that simple."

There were no directions for the exit.

Tilting his head sideways, a green glimmer abruptly intrigued his sight. Wondering what on earth it could be, he sauntered over and stood in front of the wall. From the boy's point of view it was, at the most, twenty feet up to the cavern emitting the green glow.

"I wonder how far underground I fell," he muttered.

* * *

In the same chamber as Kaiba...

Yami Bakura walked in, calmer than he was a few minutes ago. 'Where is that mirror chamber? What Item has the Ring located? I know it's not the Pharaoh's Puzzle...' the thief silently mused. 'And who is the holder of this Item? Maybe it's the Rod. Yugi and his little friends were saying something about that boy, Kaiba, now having it.'

The Ring was once again pointing to his right.

'Annoying thing, if it is not going to do its job right then why is it doing it at all?'

Not even bothering to take a _look_ at what it was pointing at, he walked on to the next room. Unfortunately, Kaiba had just poked his head out of the hidden cavern to his _right_ at that precise moment.

"Was someone just here...?" he murmured. Shrugging it off, he started climbing back down.

* * *

"It's this way!" Duke insisted.

"No, it's that way!" Tristan protested.

"No!"

"Yes!"

"Play you then!"

"Fine!"

"Rock, paper, scissors!" shouted the forever quarreling duo.

"Ha! I win!" Duke shouted triumphantly. Tristan only crossed his arms and mourned his defeat in silence.

Both had been fighting over which staircase they were going to take. Tristan was advising they take the one to their left while Duke wanted to take the one in the opposite direction. The aftermath of their _duel_ was to go to the right.

They ascended at a sluggish pace, still exhausted from the last three staircases they took.

"See, I told you. No more stairs to climb," Duke gloated at his clever, not to mention lucky, guess.

Tristan scoffed, "How do you know if the other way didn't end with the stairs too?" The other shrugged as they stopped at the entrance of a chamber. "Think the others came this way?"

"Don't know, but it's worth a try."

"Ow!" They froze in mid-conversation as someone shouted and landed with a small thud inside the chamber.

There was Kaiba, packing up his gear while holding his leg as if in pain. Duke and Tristan looked at each other, surprised. They hadn't expected to find him here, thinking he was still on the surface and all.

They got ready to call him when, "Hey, Kai-," the last they saw of Seto was of him slipping his backpack on before the chamber entrance in front of them went black and a stone wall appeared, "-ba!"

"Um...what just happened?"

* * *

Kaiba turned, thinking he heard his name, yet no one was in the entrance. At the same time the next chamber that awaited him changed as well. "Odd, I could have promised I heard...I'm just hearing things again, that's all." Sighing, he gave one good look around and spotted another floor at the top. "How far down did I fall?"

Moving to the next room, he found pitch black spiraling stairs.

* * *

Tea collapsed, sitting against a wall. "Five people are now lost, just great," she growled.

Yugi sat next to her, patting her shoulder. "We'll find them, don't worry," he consoled.

The girl shook her head though, saying, "But we still need to find the exit and our friends are scattered about the tomb which, not to mention, changes rooms constantly! What if we never get out?"

The spiky headed boy looked thoughtful for a minute and after rummaging through his backpack, he found what he needed. "Tea, I have an idea! Look, the compass, we'll use them to direct us around!"

Tea looked skeptical and asked, "But how?"

Yugi merely smiled and let her figure the idea out for herself.

"Um, oh...yeah! If we pinpoint our current location on the compass, we'll always find our way back because the chamber would be right back in the same place after a few minutes! All we need to do is follow the correct direction, right?"

"Exactly," the teen informed. Tea cheered and nearly choked Yugi to death in a tight bear hug. "Tea...I can't...breathe!" She quickly let go, his face was beet red as he collapsed on the floor.

"Sorry!"

* * *

Joey in the meantime, was freaking out. Someone or something was following him around the labyrinth like halls.

"Eeehhh! Get away from me!" the blonde screeched. "Ow!" He crashed into a wall, his flashlight had run out of batteries to top it all off. The thing had now touched his arm and one thing he was certain of though, was that the thing was most definitely not human.

"Light!" Joey cried happily and sprinted faster towards the entrance. He hurtled himself inside before the nasty whatever it was could catch him.

The thing seemed to dislike the light for it did not follow any further, but instead stayed in the dark hallway. "Yeah, stay there you coward!"

The thing shuffled its legs around as if in irritation that it could not go get its prey. Joey laughed in glee as he stood, ready to set off in a frenzy, but that was when he saw it.

The hall entrance changed into a different hall.

"Ooookay then," he whistled, "...talk about weird. Well, at least that creepy crawler," as he had named it, "isn't following me anymore, hehe."

"Whoever I come across first shall suffer my _wrath!_" he heard Yami Bakura's ranting down the next chamber.

"Hey, that sounds like Bakura! No wait." The boy scratched his chin in thought. "Not _Bakura_, but the other one. Uh oh. Let's see, evil psychopath or creepy crawler? Evil psychopath or creepy crawler?" the frightened boy pondered, now sweating.

"I shall mutilate them and send them to the _Shadow Realm!_"

Joey sweat-dropped. "Creepy crawlers it is then," he mumbled and ran back down the hall.

* * *

Snow lodge...

All students were gathered in the warm lounge, the warm orange fire crackling loudly in the background. After having gotten backthe studentshad quickly hit the warm showers and jumped into warmer clothes.

Everyone but five students were animatedly chatting away without a care in the world now.

"Alright everyone, sit," Ms. Dian's voice ordered. She took a seat in one of the empty sofas, a roll call sheet held in her hands. "Speak up when I call your last name, alright? Andria?"

"Here!"

"Dean?"

"Here!"

"Devlin?" she called,but received no answer.

"Devlin?" she called with exasperation, thinking the boy was probably flirting around with some girl that he couldn't hear her. But when she didn't find him among the mass of children she began to worry. "Mr. Haiahashi, can you check upstairs and see if he's still in his room, please?"

He nodded, leaving the lounge and heading upstairs. Yet returned in a matter of minutes, aworried frown plastered on. "Wheeler, Joseph? Taylor, Tristan? Kaiba, Seto?" she called hopefully.

Of course no one answered, because none of them were there.

The teachers' and students' faces were white as chalk now. Only three girls and two boys raised their hands at that moment. "Yes, what is it?"

"Um...well," Jake began. "Yugi isn't here either."

"Nor Bakura," Jimmy added. At this, the teacher nearly dropped her roll call sheet.

"Neither is Tea, Ms. Dian," Melissa added to the list of bad news.

"S-she told us that she w-would be right back though," Amie sobbed.

"I think she had seen Yugi and the, uh, others..." Lanette stopped as her teacher dropped her sheet.

Ms. Dian being the young teacher she was, had a reputation to maintain. Now she had _seven_ students missing, all whom she had lost track of in one day, which did not bode well for her career. Not to mention that the parents of six students had put _their_ children under _her_ care, which meant she would be facing a lot of suing charges.

* * *

Back in a dark hall...

Setowas restinghis leg, letting the aching pain subside into a dull throb.

Then standing up with somedifficulty, hegrudgingly limpedaround a dark corner, only to find himself on the upper part of the room he had previously been in.

The pillars lining the aisles of the bottom part of the room didn't finish goingall the way up to the ceiling, but instead, were crumbled in half, making it simple and easy foranyone to travel across them.

And so Kaiba clumsilyjumped onto the nearest pillar, almost slipping off. He was exhausted all of a sudden, nearly letting his grip slacken. But still, somehow he managed to steady himself and carefully jump onto a monkey bar like part of the ceiling. "Honestly,I feel like a five year old,not to mentiona monkey," he grumbled.

Swinging overto the other side of the room, the boy dropped onto solid ground and continued into the chamber in front of him.

Kaiba didn't evencompliment the interior, just merely gave the place a brief glance.

Gold and blue curtains hung all around the ceiling. Red streamers of cloth hanging halfway to the bottom of the room. Green, mini jungle like palm trees, which took him by surprise,in pots were in each corner of the room.

And in the middle of all the decorations lay a singlestone slab.

Its perfectly smooth surface and evenly shaped rectangle made itseem almost like an altar. For some reason Kaiba felt uneasy in there, even the Rod seemed to agree.

_'Leave...leave now...,'_ a voice whispered.

Taking a step back he turned away, ready to leave in a sprint when he noticed there was no exit anymore. 'Hm, wha-? Where did the exit go? This must be some kind of a joke!' he thought in anger.

Then, with a small chuckle, Kaiba turned around and squared his shoulders. Therewas absolutely _nothing_ there that could hurthim anymore, and with that in mindhe walked towards the altar.

'So why am I so wor-' "Ah!" The ground beneath him gave way to an abyss with big glinting, sharp spikes.

Somebody was holding his hand, for he would have surely fallen to his doom by now. The ends of this person's long hair were tickling Kaiba's face, causing him to shut his eyes. His mind idly processed he twinge of pain he felt as this person's nails dug into his wrist. Thensuddenly he was yankedup.

The brunette dizzily looked over the edge, then over tothis person, only to find mere air.

"Oooh ghosts," Kaiba whispered as a new room suddenly appeared across the room. He sat there glaring for a moment, contemplating a few things over. "Moving chambers, huh?"He perked a brow, letting five minutes pass by to see again the same chamber change into a different one. "So that's the secret."

Cautiously he dragged himself to the entrance, making sure there weren't any other trap floors along the way. Then taking a small peek around the entrance, he saw nothing but an empty dank room. But Kaiba was smarter than that, andbarely put a hand inside before he noted that spike walls on either side began moving in on any intruder.

He put one foot in and to his horror, spike walls on both sides were moving in quickly to trap any intruder. He gagged as the two walls came together, bloody spikes intertwined.

Patiently waiting for another five minutes passed,heset his watch to beep every other five minutes as he snuck a small peek around the entrance, again.

* * *

Please send all questions, comments, criticisms to the e-mail address on my bio page. Check my bio for update information. Thank you!

Copyright (C) 2004 by Rune-Sorceress. All rights reserved.


	5. The Geeks And Spiders

**The High Priest's Secret Tomb**

* * *

**Disclaimer:** I do not own **'Yu-Gi-Oh!'** Kazuki Takahashi, Warner Brothers, 4Kids Entertainment, and etc. does.

**Chapter:** The Geeks And Spiders

* * *

The only sound was the distant echo of water...

...as shuffling feet sauntered on down the darkening hall. "Yugi, where do you think that water is coming from?" Tea whispered.

The boy looked at the ground and noticed that their shoes were getting soaked at the heels. The hallway's stone ground was filled with an inch of high water. "M-maybe the melting snow?" Yugi stuttered. It was cold in wherever they were going towards.

Tea shivered and with a twinge of hope asked, "Well, we don't know how long this tomb's been here, so what if the water has been gathering up into some kind of lake?"

Yugi laughed, "True, but the water would be freezing cold!"

The light was now so dim to the point where they had to get their flashlights out.

"But wherever there's water, isn't there usually an exit?" Tea wondered.

"Hm, that is true. Hey," Yugi stretched an arm out and halted his friend. "...did you h-hear that?"

The brunetteblinked. "Hear what?"

"Shhh, listen..."

The distant running of water was now audible as well, but that wasn't what he was referring to. The boy was referring to the fast paced scuttling on stone.

"Could it be one of the guys?" Yugi inquiredonly toreceive a negative.

"None of them run or walk that fast...and besides, listen to the steps. There's water on the ground, so there would be splashing sounds if they were even walking _on_ the ground."

Their breaths were now hitched in their throats as they hushed their apprehensive breathing. Yugi tugged at Tea's arm, leading her back down the opposite direction. Unfortunately something was coming towards them down that hall as well.

A new chamber then popped up on the wall next to them.

Before entering though, the quick steps had suddenly stopped.Thequivering duolooked down the halls, but nothing was in their line of sight. "Where'd they go...?"

Now they knew what it was that was following them, for they creatures were above them now. And not wanting to call more attention upon themselves, the pair slowly inched towards the chamber.

* * *

Tristan was pushing and pounding on a wall as Duke shook his head. "That won't work Tristan, Kaiba's probably in a different room by now."

The other sighed. "But how could he have just vanished like that?"

The boy's green eyes narrowed in growing annoyance. "I told you already, the tomb must change rooms everynow and then because that's the way it was designed!" he explained,but didn't manage toconvince the doubtful Tristan one bit. "I give up! Keep pushing that wall to keep yourself preoccupied if you want, I don't ca-," Duke stopped.

"What's wrong?" his friend asked. Duke was staring at some part under one of the stairs as his answer. Something was moving around in the shadows.

Tristan flashed some light towards it. "What is that thing?" he exclaimed and was quickly hit over the head for this.

"Shhh! Keep your voice down, we don't need or want that thing waking up!" Duke quieted in a low whisper. Both watched in great disgust as the thing slept on for a minute or two.

"Gross man, what is it?" Tristan took the flashlight's light off the thing.

"It looks like a huge spider,"his companionstated, flashing light on it again. "Oh boy...it's gone."

Both sweat-dropped. "Gone!" The duo scanned around the area, not much to check anyway.

There were merely two torches of fire that werekeeping themcompany. That is,besides the bottomless abyss traveling all the way down the stairs they had previously climbed.

"Think spiders eat people?" Duke frantically asked, looking up above them.

"I don't know, but I'm not sticking around to find out!" The wall Tristan had been pushing finally changed into a chamber and both boys scrambled as quickly as possible inside.

* * *

Back in the dome like chamber...again...

Yami Bakura was pacing back and forth on the high, long, and narrow catwalk. "So these chambers change every so often. Hm, I guess I underestimated that crazy man," he chuckled, but just as quickly regained his scowling demeanor. "That is still no excuse for why I cannot find that chamber! No one outsmarts a tomb thief!"

_The night air was crisp and frigid, a sandstorm was coming as two silhouettes secretly spoke..._

_"So tomb thief, you have everything in set?" asked a stranger. _

_"Hmmhmm, do not worry yourself about such trivalries. Just concentrate on your part of this partnership," Yami Bakura assured. _

_The stranger's left eye flashed. "You will remember that he-," _

_"Yes, yes, of course," the spirit nodded._

_"Do not even think of back stabbing me thief. I know your every thought before you even think it." _

_Yami Bakura gave him a scowl. "You just make sure you don't do the back stabbing. But back to the point, do not fail me in bringing all five other Millennium Items to the altar. After all has gone well, you may do as you wish."_

_"And if all goes wrong?" the stranger queried._

_Yami Bakura did not respond though._

_The other smirked. "Ah, so you have no plan to carry on with if this little fiasco fails you then? And here I was thinking you tomb thieves were intelligent, seeing as how you outsmart every tomb you break into." _

_"Silence!" _

_The stranger didn't flinch. "It would be quite interesting to see how you fare with my tomb though. I doubt you would be able to handle it." _

_Yami Bakura looked mildly interested. "Your tomb?" he asked. _

_"Yes, I have a tomb, just in case this plan goes to fail." _

_"Care to elaborate some more and stop stalling?" the shorter albino prompted impatiently, which only caused his companion to laugh. _

_"My tomb was specially designed with magic and traps, which I will not elaborate with you." The evil spirit glared. "But I will tell you a bit about this certain...chamber..." _

_"Well?" Yami Bakura demanded._

_"Patience my friend." _

_"I am not your friend!"_

_The stranger's left eye flashed once more as he continued, "The twelve mirrored chamber, it obviously holds twelve mirrors, but they hold a certain power to them. They were made from a special type of shadow magic. They hold be-, well, if you are unfortunate enough you will find out." The stranger was stalling once again. _

_"Yes, but what do mirrors have anything to do with your plan?" _

_"Well...if he refuses to comply with his destiny these mirrors shall set him in the right path." _

_Yami Bakura raised an eyebrow. "And may I ask what makes you think his destiny is that of the Pharaoh's?" _

_"Hmmm, that is not any of your business, is it?" the stranger countered. _

_"No, but care to reveal the whereabouts of this tomb then?" _

_There was a pause and then the other answered, "In a distant land, over the sea to the west. Quite the opposite of Egypt, very cold if I do say so myself...and very white."_

_The albino haired thief laughed."You wish for him to be the ultimate King of Darkness and yet you place your sanctuary in the complete opposite of it?" _

_The stranger found nothing amusing though. "It may be so, but you call yourself the King of the Shadows." _

_"Hm, hair color does not matter in this case, for I can say the same for you. The setting of which you place dark power in is what matters most." _

_"Perhaps, but my tomb is not above ground with the rest of the white, no, it is underneath the dark ground. With a few, what shall I call them? Pets of mine." _

_The thief stopped laughing. "Where have you put the entrance then?" _

_"You would love for me to tell you because you know there are treasures there, would you not?"_

_The younger of the two didn't answer._

_"Three certain caves is all I am going to give you."_

_Both were quiet for a moment. "How did you find this distant place?" _

_"Magic," was all the cloaked man said. _

_"And how do you expect to lure the boy all the way over there to begin with?" Yami Bakura further interrogated. _

_"You are quite the curious one aren't you?" asked the stranger. "Well, to put it simply short, three Millennium Item holders shall assist me." _

_"You have wasted a great deal of time and gold for something you shall not need, for my plan will not fail." _

_The stranger only smiled maliciously. 'Says you thief, but this is only a precaution for the present and the future, whether it be millennias later,' the stranger thought to himself. _

_The two then departed ways without another word as the sand began to pick up pace with the blowing wind._

Yami Bakura was snapped back to the present as he shouted, "No! You will not have the last laugh!"

Quickly turning around to go through the hall, he thought he had heard someone walking up to him. 'Must be those pets of his,' he thought, but suddenly froze in mid-step. 'What are these pets of his?'

Taking the horribly heavy backpack his vessel was carrying off, he took a flashlight out. After working out how to turn it on he looked around the room, but there was nothing. "Must be dogs or maybe even bats, how original," mocked the thief derisively. Walking through the hall entrance he braced himself for anything, wondering, "I know bats can survive a long time without food, but dogs?"

Deciding it best to ignore that small fact he turned a corner and noticed an inch of water hit his feet. Yami Bakura sighed, "Water means an exit, but that is not what I am looking for."

A strange carving on the floor then caught his eye.

Jirai Gumo.

Twelve feet moving all at breakneck speed suddenly broke out, almost as if though the creatures had been waiting for that precise moment.

The noise stopped just above him, yet when he looked up he gave a wary smirked. "Looks like I have underestimated him once again," Yami Bakura murmured.

Bakura was then momentarily freed as he dropped to his knees. "Not again," he groaned. "Where am I now, anyway? Hey Tea! Anybody...?"

That was when he caught a glimpse of them, andnot even having the nerve to yell out yet, Bakura frantically scrambled to his feet and ran for his dear life.

* * *

"I love food, food loves me!" Joey sang his version of the _Barney Theme_. He had ingeniously come up with it at the age of five. "We're a happy family! With a great big gulp and bite from me to you! Won't you say you love me too!"

"Aaaahhh!" someone's yelling pierced the dead silence. "Someone help me!"

"Hey, that sounded like Bakura!" Joey cheered, now he wouldn't have to walk around in the dark alone.

Bakurawas sprinting down the hall, two nasty black spiders hot on his heels.

"Hey, pal!Over here!" the blonde called, jumpingand waving in the air. Then almost immediately stopped as he optedfor running down the hall he had previously come from. "Please don't send me to the Shadow Realm, Mr. Evil Spirit!"

"Joey, it's me, Bakura!" reassured his friend.

"Oh, really?" Joey suddenly stopped. "Well, in that case am I glad to see you ba-,"

"Don't stop running!" Bakura interrupted.

The blonde blinked. "Eh? Gaahhh! I forgot!" Now the two friends were running side by side. "So, who are your friends?" Joey kidded.

"Joey, we're going to die! How can you joke around at a time like this?"

"Hehe, sorry!" Making a turn to their right they stepped into the chamber Joey had runaway from, thinking the evil spirit was going to mutilate him. "Hey! What gives? They aren't supposed to like the light!"he cried out.

"Maybe you met something else!" Bakura suggested.

Joey thought for a minute. "But then that means there are other monsters in here with us!"

Crossing about five chambers and going in all sorts of directions, both knew they weren getting nowhere.

* * *

"I don't think these things are getting tired!" Tea informed. When she found no short boy running next to her she panicked.

Yugi was crawling and panting a few feet behind her, his short legs weren't getting him anywhere so he switched over to Yami.

"Hmmm, what?" Yami turned to see what he was supposed to be running from.

"Yugi! Don't just sit there!" The brunette grabbed Yami by the back of his collar, dragging him like a stuffed toy.

"Tea, what are those things?" asked the Pharaoh.

Tea turned her head and studied the boy's face more closely. It was Yami. "Yami? What are you-? Haven't you ever seen a spider?"

The long ago Pharaoh's eyes turned into saucers at this. "Not that huge!"

In all honesty, Tea was getting exhausted from carrying Yami across who knows how many rooms. "Still following us, Yami?" she queried.

"Unfortunately, yes!" he answered. Almost fainting as the spiders' creepy pincer pinchers nearly grabbed his legs.

* * *

Duke and Tristan weren't cooperating very well at the moment.

"It's that way!" Duke once again insisted.

Tristan thought otherwise though. "It's the other way!"

"No, it isn't!"

"Here they come!"

**"That way then!"** both agreed on the other's last choice. Sweat-dropping, they went left.

"So tired," complained the raven headed boy.

"Suck it up!" Tristan advised.

Jumping off the monkey bar like part of the ceiling, Kaiba had long ago passed, they ran on intothe nextroom. Luckily it wasn't the altar room though, but instead a normal stable chamber. Going onto the next room they noticed that on either side of them bloody spikes were moving in on them.

Unable to utter a word of horror, the duo _gracefully _hurtled themselves out at the last minute. Only scrambling away from the chamber when oneof their spider's legs fell near them.

"Now that's just plain gross!" Duke kicked the thing away. Thankfully they were saved more running by the spiky walls.

Nowtheir first and main goal was to regroup with the others.

* * *

On the top mosthighest floor...

Kaiba was aimlesslyambling down one of the many corridors of the upper tomb, cautiously making sure there weren't any fake walls or floors along the way.

"What kind of person would make places like this? Oh, that's right, an insane person would," he concluded with an air of cynicism.

Kaiba honestly didn't see why these abstract places fascinated most people, including his brother.

He partly blamed Yugi and his convention for his brother's new found obsession, but he was equally at fault for letting him associate with the group to begin with. He often found himself wondering: What was the deal with these geeks? They constantly moved from one odd theme to an even odder one.

But frustratingly never able to find an answer, Kaiba gave the case a rest for the umpteenth time. For now he continued to tape things on camera.

Silently, he walked to stand right underneatha squarehole in the ceiling above him. All the whilewondering how he was supposed to get up there.

But by the time he made it to the middle of the room, he was knocked to the floor, havingcrashed into something solid, almost like metal.

Outstretching a hand,the tips of Kaiba's fingers brushed against an invisible, climbable wall. "Huh? Hmph, what a surprise. Here I am, working my brain off for such a little matter, but when it comes to the big things, like finding an exit, it's never that easy," he grumbled.

Not wanting to waste any more of his time in this...place, he readied himself to start climbing.

That was when he heard two familiar people...

"Hey Kaiba! Finally, we found you!"

"Sheesh! We thought you were probably eaten by one of those spiders!"

Kaiba turned, behind him were a running and huffing Duke and Tristan. He scowled. 'The geeks are here too? And why would I be eaten by spiders?'

Upon reachingtheir roommatethey stopped and stared at him for a while. "Um, Kaiba...what are you doing? Are you practicing to work as a mime or something?" Duke laughed.

Kaiba glared at them, how dare they come and make the situation worse than it already was! He was doing just as horribly on his own, but now he had to share it with them?

"AAAHHH!" the yelling of four certain people echoed around them.

The newly formed trio looked to their left and right as thirty-two shuffling feet were heard running down both opposite halls.

* * *

Please send all questions, comments, criticisms to the e-mail address on my bio page. Check my bio for update information. Thank you!

Copyright (C) 2004 by Rune-Sorceress. All rights reserved.


	6. Past And Present Collide

**The High Priest's Secret Tomb**

* * *

**Disclaimer:** I do not own **'Yu-Gi-Oh!'** Kazuki Takahashi, Warner Brothers, 4Kids Entertainment, and etc. does.

**Chapter:** Past And Present Collide

* * *

"..." the newly formed trio stayed silent.

From their left came a hysterical Tea and a swirly eyed Yami and from their right came a sane Bakura and a crying Joey.

"Why me?" all four friends cried simultaneously, stepping into the chamber at the last second. And upon entering, the entrances' changed, taking with them the four spiders.

When the four friends finally looked up they noticed the others. "It's Duke and Tristan...and Kaiba?" Unfortunately, once the running quartet tried to stop sprinting it was too late, they had been going too fast.

They all crashed into each other...

"Ow! My head!" Tristan exclaimed in agony.

"My face!" Joey cried.

Kaiba, who had been ready to climb the invisible ladder anyway, had just hoisted himself out of harms way.

After having recovered from the sudden crash, all six friends started hugging and laughing. They were relieved beyond imagination to be back together. When a moment passed they again noticed the silent Kaiba.

The boy had barely touched the ground when Joey silently stepped up behind him and...lunged at him. "This is all your fault rich boy!"

Kaiba rolled his eyes, merely hoisting himself up once more.

Gasping in shock, Joey crashed face first into the invisible ladder. He groaned in pain, gingerly touching his nose. "I didn't think mimes could actually touch the things they made."

"Didn't know you had a brain to think with," his rival retorted as he jumped down. The brunette kept a firm grip on the ladder though, thinking it might disappear if he let go.

Yugi, who had just switched places with Yami, smiled. "We finally found you!" But all to soon frowned. "How did you get down here in the first place?" he asked.

Before the taller boy could even decide on whether or not to answer, Duke intercepted. "How did you get lost in the storm to begin with?"

Kaiba's mood darkened considerably. Like he had thought a few minutes ago, it was bad enough being stuck in a tomb on his own, but now he had to share his misery with _them?_

Such a joy!

But instead he responded in his usual manner, "That's none of your business, now is it?" With that he resumed climbing the ladders again.

Yugi and his friends blinked, "Wait for us!" and followed suit.

Upon reaching the top of the square hole, the group found Kaiba sitting on a piece of stone beside a small palm tree, fixing the bandages on his leg.

"You haven't answered our questions yet," Yugi stated insistently.

Kaiba grit his teeth in annoyance. "I got lost while looking for something, alright?" He sent them a warning glare, he knew they were holding back multiple questions he didn't want to answer.

"Did you by any chance bump into any of those creepy things?" Tea probed.

"What creepy things?" he replied coldly.

Bakura looked disbelievingly at him. "The spiders! The humongous sized ones! Hmmm? Hey,where did you get that cut?"

No one received any answers to their inquiries as Kaiba stood from his perch and walked across the unlit room.

Yet before anyone could ask what he was doing, the torches around the room lit up, filling the place with a dim light.

Bouncing off the warm glow were twelve magnificently sculptured mirrors. Most were in awe at the beauty of them, while others went unimpressed.

One thing that did strike as odd was the fact that their was no visible rust or scratch on these mirrors, nor was there even the tiniest speck of dust.

"How beautiful," Tea breathed in wonderment.

Tristan in the meantime was trying to straighten his hair back to its usual point while Yugi too was fixing his hair, it looked tired of standing up.

Kaiba on the other hand was one of the few who went unimpressed by the mirrors. In fact, he seemed to hold a certain loathing for them in his eyes. And although he did notice his hair was completely dishelved, he could really care less at the moment.

Joey started laughing gleefully to himself. "Imagine how many bucks we could make selling these priceless beauties!" he voiced out to his friends.

Bakura nodded, an evil smirk breaking across his face.

'So, it was Kaiba who held the Item my Ring was seeking for all along. And what do you know, it's the Rod Marik had promised me back in Battle City,' Yami Bakura thought delightedly. He took a quick glance at the Rod hanging on Kaiba's belt then over to the Puzzle around Yugi's neck. 'Hmmm, well, Kaiba should be like taking candy from a baby. The boy is smart, I'll give him that, but when it comes to magic he's clueless. Yugi unfortunately is a different story though...'

* * *

Later at 8:30 p.m. that night...

Having blocked the hole on the ground with countless of broken stones and wood from around the room, they were all ready for some well deserved rest.

Everyone was falling fast asleep, that is they _were_, when Kaiba purposely said, "Don't let the bed bugs bite."

At which everyone's eyes snapped open, even Joey had the nerve to wake up with a start. All six restlessly checked to see if the hole was securely blocked, looked for any trap walls that would let the spiders in, double checked the hole, searched around in dark spots, triple checked the hole, and so on.

After almost an hour they all finally went to sleep, except Yami Bakura, who after getting up and being startled by Joey's sleep talk, waited another half hour before setting off with his plan.

'He was lucky that time, it seems Fate is on his side at the moment, but no matter. That was only a minor interruption to the plan,' Yami Bakura thought, silently crawling across the room to Kaiba's side. 'Let's see, where is it? Ah, there.' The thief spotted the Rod underneath Kaiba's backpack, which the boy was using as a pillow. 'I bet he doesn't even know how to seal his ownership on the Item anyway.'

Going a little closer, the albino headed thief accidentally slipped on a piece of Kaiba's sweater, which he was using as a cover. But managed to catch himself in time before hitting the cold floor.

The spirit awoke no one, except Kaiba.

That was one of the most amateurish moves someone could have done when trying to steal something from Seto Kaiba. He whom, no thanks to his brother, was used to waking at any little sound. Whether it be a creak in the floor or the light sound of breathing close by, he could hear it.

Barely catching a small glimpse of the Ring around the others neck as he turned onto his arm, Kaiba made sure to keep his hand close to the Rod.

'I knew this oddball was going to try something,' Kaiba thought, recalling the times he caught the spirit glancing at his Rod every few minutes. He then thought back to the Battle City Finals and to the endless conversations about possessing spirits between Yugi and his friends. Kaiba inwardly snorted. 'More like personality malfunctions, sort of reminds me of Jeckyll and Hyde.'

Meanwhile, Yami Bakura snapped out of his stupor. 'I'm becoming tactless!' he chided himself.

Kaiba was then again inspired. 'I'll try that trick Marik did, the one after each of his duels. I must give the guy some credit, he's a genius.'

Yami Bakura's hand was a few inches away from the Rod and he silently laughed. 'This is almost too easy to be true!' But his bubble was soon burst when he noticed that his target was indeed awake. Having no time to react at his new predicament, Kaiba took this as his cue and swung the golden Item down on his predator's head.

A golden light flashed and slowly resided as Bakura dropped to the floor in a heap.

Getting up and dragging the unconscious boy back to the other side of the room. Kaiba dropped the albino by his backpack and took his prize. As he had heard, it was what you earned, from Marik's constant ranting.

Striding back to his side, Kaiba placed both Items in his backpack before dozing back to sleep, at the same time thinking, 'I'm a bit rusty at handling the thing, but I'll get the hang of it...'

* * *

Hours later...

The twelve mirrors stopped radiatingtheir relaxing glow and instead gave out a steely aura. The fire on the torches flickered off and no one moved a muscle in the cold dark room, almost seeming dead. But the eerie quietness was soon broken by incoherent whispering...

...as a small ball of gray fog gathered itself from within the twelve mirrors into the middle of the room. Streaks of silver mist appeared above three bodies and the substance was forcibly extracted from them by the fog. When it was finished, the fog like spirit dispersed, and the clinking of metal scratching stone walls commenced.

* * *

A cloaked figure steadily worked in preparing things into correct order. "It is almost time. In the end it matters not what the choice is, the result will be that he _will_ see the darkness." The shadow walked to the center of the circle and placed a black jar full of a thick liquid substance on a stone pillar.

Everything was set for the ceremony.

* * *

The clinking of metal grew louder as it neared the round room. Through a small hole, that Yugi and the his friends had missed, the pets silently crawled in.

Prowling around the creatures walked over every body, looking for one specific person among the seven. Yet not knowing who was who, they lifted three of the bodies up and dragged them away through the hole.

Now only four out of seven people remained. A loud pounding underneath the covered exit resonated throughout the night, unheard by any of them.

* * *

Next day...

Tea's vision was groggy as goose bumps ran up and down her arms. The cold hit her with a renewed force and she yawned. With a long sigh the girl squinted at her watch and she was instantly wide awake. "No way! This thing must be broken or something!"

Joey was amazingly awakened by the shout. "Tea, do you mind keeping it down a notch? We're trying to sleep here," mumbled the grumpy blonde.

"Why are you up at five in the morning anyway?" Duke asked.

Tea scoffed, "It's not five in the morning! It's seven o' clock!"

The three boys looked unconcerned though. "So...?" Tristan sighed as she tossed her watch at them.

"At night!"

They blinked, taking a better look at the watch. "Man, I know we were tired, but so tired as to sleep for _22 hours_ is ridiculous!" Tristan shouted.

Joey huffed, he sure didn't feel relaxed. On the contrary, he felt as if though he had stayed up all night...and day. "What does your watch say, Yug?" he asked, turning to the empty space his friend was supposed to be in. "...Hey, where'd he go? Hey, Bakura have you seen...never mind."

"Kaiba's not here either," Duke informed. Looking over to their exit he added, "Plus, the exit's still blocked up."

Tea retrieved her watch and scanned the room. "The mirrors are missing and they took their backpacks with them too."

Tristan thought for a silent moment. "Well, the only ones missing are theones with Millennium Items, maybe they're somewhere dueling the evil spirit?" he stated. They didn't have the reaction he was hoping they'd have.

Everyone started panicking.

'What if he sent them to the Shadow Realm already?' Joey quickly thought of the worst.

"Come on, maybe we missed a secret entrance last night or something," Tristan said, which again, didn't give him the response he was hoping for.

Their faces turned a light shade of blue at the recollection that the spiders were probably still waiting for them outside.

But still, they searched around the room. Spending almost half the portion of an hour looking around for anything, it didn't end in vain though. "I found something!" Tea called to her companions.

"Good eye, Tea! Never would have seen that there." Joey grinned.

A small hole, big enough for only one person to go through it at a time, was hidden in the shadows of a corner. "Well then, whe-," a sudden crash behind the quartet interrupted Duke from continuing. The sounds of breaking stone and wood resounded throughout the chamber and to their horror, a long spider leg poked into view.

"Ladies first!" Teacried andzoomedinto the small hole first.

"I thought you said _chickens_ first!" Joey called, following suit.

The other two merely rolled their eyes as Duke went next. Just as the spiders came in and charged towards them, Tristan followed in the back of the line.

And the spiders being _huge_ and the hole being _small_ meant that they couldn't follow their prey any further.

As the tunnel sloped downward, "Wha-, aahhh!" all four yelped. They too slid to the bottom and came flying out at the end, plummeting down into the cold.

"Tea, you a-alright?" Tristan stuttered.

"The w-water, it's freezing c-cold!" she shivered, Joey and Duke resurfacing the water to join them.

"Where a-are we?" Joey queried.

Thegroup of friendswere at the moment in a cavern like part of the tomb full of water, almost as big as a lake. Quickly scanning their surroundings, theydistinctly heard someone or something else swimming in the lake besides them.

"Look up ahead, we can climb those rocks t-to get out." Duke pointed over to a wall with jagged platforms.

Hurriedly reaching their shore and climbing out, Tea clapped her hands together and said, "I knew it!" At her friends' blank stares she elaborated some more. "W-when Yugi and I were looking for you guys we saw water was flooding one of the halls. So we t-thought that where there's water, there's b-bound to be an e-exit."

Tristan blinked. "Where's the exit then?"

His answer, Tea pointing a fingerhigh above them. There, at the top most part of the wall, was a tunnel that led upwards. She assumed that had to be the exit because water was coming through it.

"Woohoo! We can finally get out!" they cheered, but were rudely interrupted by the sound of the moving water.

"Uh...hehe, maybe we should leave a-and look for the others b-before whatever it is that's in there joins us," Joey suggested.

As everyone stood, each looked at the exit longingly...but they had other business to attend to for now. Taking his compass out, Tristan informed them of their location so as to find their way back again.

* * *

Elsewhere...

Big amethyst eyes opened to stare back at a funny looking ceiling. "Hm," he mumbled, "...it looks like it's going to squish me." Then realizing that that was exactly what the ceiling was going to do, Yugi snapped up to a sitting position. "It is going to squish me!" he shouted, scrambling off the cold floor and scuttling out into a hall.

The short boy shivered, noting that he felt considerably lighter now. He blinked, "My backpack!" and ran back in and out at breakneck speed as the ceiling began to flatten his hair. Hugging the brown sack, grateful for his compass's safety, the boy tapped the Puzzle's eye.

'Yami, weren't you supposed to be keeping watch during the night?' he asked gruffly.

Yugi waited a while, thinking it odd that Yami was taking so long to answer him. 'Hello? Earth to Yami!'

Something was obviously wrong. Only something or someone with tremendous magic could block their connection. Jogging at a light pace, Yugi began to think of the horrible possibilities that could have happened to the others. The only chamber entrance visible in that whole hall was a few feet ahead of him.

Taking a small peek inside, panic rushed through him once more. Bakura lay motionless inside...

"Psst, Bakura. Come on, get up," Yugi called to the albino. He would have gone in and gotten the boy out himself, but was afraid that he might activate a trap of some sort. "Bakura this is no time to be sleeping!" he shouted, then thought better of it.

He might attract the unwanted attention of spiders if they heard him.

'Well, it always works with Joey,' Yugi thought desperately. "Bakura, class is over, it's time to eat!" he whispered.

At this, Bakura torpidly sat up, looking around until he spotted a crazy looking Yugi, who was frantically waving him over at the chamber's exit.

Making his way out, Bakura asked, "What's wrong? Where did the others go?"

Yugi shrugged. "Your guess is as good as mine... I can't seem to get through to Yami at moment," he added at Bakura's glance towards the Puzzle.

With a long sigh, the taller of the two noticed that he too felt considerably lighter now. "My backpack!" he gasped, running back inside the room.

Coming back to the hall, backpack in hand, Bakura sat on the floor and rummaged through his sack. "By the by, what time is it?" he asked curiously.

Swiftly glancing at his wristwatch, Yugi's eyes almost popped out. "7:30 p.m.!"

Bakura gave his companion a skeptic look. "What? Are you sure that watch is right?"

Yugi shook the watch and heard for any rattling sounds, but there were none which indicated it was broken. "What are you doing?" he asked, staring at the albino, still rummaging through his sack.

"Well, we're going to need energy to look for the others, and we obviously missed three meals, so it wouldn't hurt to eat, would it?"

"...Mm, I guess not." Sitting down next to him as well, Yugi looked through his backpack.

Bakura unconsciously rubbed the top of his head. "Ow. I don't remember hitting my head anywhere," he groaned.

Yugi thought for a moment, taking a bite of a sandwich. "Maybe the spirit of the Ring did?" he suggested at which Bakura nodded understandingly.

* * *

In a soul room...

"Hello? Yugi? Answer me!" Yami shouted as he looked up above him. Then running up to his own soul room door he tried to tackle it down.

Yet still it would not budge, he was locked in.

"Yugi!" coughed the Pharaoh. "Well, that's...obviously not working," he told himself, massaging his throat.

Going back into the maze like chamber that were some of his memories, Yami sat at the foot of one of the many stairs with a huff. "What could have happened? Could this magic really be so strong so as to block my communication with Yugi?"

His frown deepened as he fell silent, deep in concentration. That power he ad felt before, could it be the cause of this mess? But his peace and quiet was all too soon broken by the sound of distant steps. Quickly fading away as the creak of a door being opened and closed reached his alert ears.

"What? Who goes there?" Yami questioned, his eyes narrowing as they darted from place to place. "Show yourself, coward!"

But all was silent.

Sighing in annoyance and defeat, he seated himself once more and continued thinking bitter thoughts to himself. So many things still eluded him and he had yet to remember many things.

The spirit glanced around at all the maze's doors and stairs still left to explore.

* * *

Meanwhile...

"Boring," Kaiba stressed the word out as he idly swung his good leg over the edge of a stone slab. The boy too had been separated from the rest of the group.

Although he wasn't as devastated, if at all for that matter, but now he was lost once more.

The worst part about it all being that he wasn't even sure if he was in his own realm or not. He wasn't one to believe in such ludicrous things, but taking all he had gone through into account, he wasn't surprised to find himself thinking like the geeks nowadays.

Bored of doing nothing for the past twenty minutes, Kaiba took the flashlight out, constantly wondering where his watch went to.

The flashlight's beam of illumination seemed to be swallowed by the darkness though. So, figuring since the useless thing didn't work in this place, he would drop it to see how far down it was from where he was sitting.

And so Kaiba waited, waited, waited, waited, and then he heard the distant contact with the floor.

"Well, jumping down is definitely out of the question," he sighed.

Picking the Millennium Ring out of his backpack,he begantwirling it around his finger, all the while wondering what the thing was supposed to do.

Thinking he was going to hit the stone behind him, the boy swung himself back...to instead fall over the edge.

"Wha-!"Kaiba yelped, feeling a sudden force knock the wind out of him. He had stopped, and was dangling in mid-blackness. "Whoever's there better get me down now!" he ordered, thrashing about the place. "Get me down this instant or I'll personally make sure you die!"

And then without warning, the brunette was unceremoniously dropped to the ground. "Watch it!" he bellowed, clutching his left arm tightly. "It better not be broken... Oh good, there's my watch...and my flashlight."

The itemlay on the dark ground,smashed to pieces. Scooping his precious watch up off the ground he strapped it back into place and would have looked at the time, but a loud thud prevented him from doing so.

His backpack had fallen from above.

"Now then, let's see what this thing can do." Kaiba glared at the Ring and its five pointers were automatically activated. Leading the way towards the location of two Items it detected. "I found myself a compass," he said and kicked the remains of the broken flashlight out of his way.

After nearly stumbling down a staircase that was camouflaged with the rest of the dark, he at long last came to the exit. "Well, this is certainly...out of the ordinary, and that's saying a lot," he commented.

Everywhere he looked there were pieces of floating rocks, some small, others extremely huge. The floating rocks differed in colors, as most were a glowing green while others were a glowing blue.

Kaiba himself was on a green island rock, as he had concluded by looking over the ledge to see the whole place was made up of nothing but an abyss. Behind him was a black temple, looking like it was made of the smoothest ebony marble.

"Hn, I hate this place."

Kaiba soon caught sight of something in the far distance, a temple. And seeing as there was really no other choice but to go, he steadily crossed a narrow bridge. Soon breaking into a sprint, even though he knew this would only worsen the wound on his leg later on.

Hopping from rock to the next he was being weighed down considerably by his backpack, the Ring wasn't helping either. It seemed to be having difficulty, as it was locating two Items in the same direction, but in completely different places.

Finally arriving at his unknown destination, Kaiba's face contorted into a scowl as he began cursing every event that led up to this moment. "Despicable trip, idiotic teacher, useless hike, dumb cave..." he ranted on until he entered the temple doors. "There better be someone who lives here," Kaiba's voice bounced off the walls, his footsteps echoing with every step he took on the marble floor.

Cautiously wandering into a chamber hidden in the shadows, his colbat blue eyes spotted a few odd statues in each corner. In great distaste he critically said, "What odd sense of art...hmph! I'd have this place better decorated with just a few finely crafted dragon statues." The boy nodded knowingly.

But ignoring the eeriness of the place he continued to the end of the room, a dead end.

Then looking to his right he found stairs leading somewhere high above, past the rooftop. "My legs are going to kill me tomorrow,"he mutteredgrudgingly.

* * *

Yugi and Bakura were running down one of the many corridors of the upper tomb, the latter of the two navigating them towards the room with the invisible ladder. "Come on Yugi, the chamber is just down this hall," he stated.

Turning the corner of the hall they were suddenly knocked down by four very wet figures. "Aaahhh! It's the spiders coming back to eat us!" Joey shouted, covering his head under his arms.

Duke jabbed him in the gut. "It's only Bakura and Yugi, dweeb!" Tea and Tristan sighed with relief in the background.

_"YUGI!"_ Yami's voice finally reached his counterpart's ears, causing him to shout out in surprise and pain.

"What's wrong Yugi?" Tea asked, startled out of her wits.

"Hehe, Yami's calling, I'll be right back guys."

'About time you showed up!' Yugi reprimanded moodily.

Yami blinked, amazed that his yelling actually got him somewhere. _"Hmph! About I showed up? It's about time you answered!"_ the spirit of the Puzzle croakily informed. His voice was getting raspy from all the futile attempts to call his counterpart.

The shorter of the two shook his head and waved the bickering aside. 'You don't think there's someone at fault for this, do you?' he asked, hopefully his suspicions could be proven wrong.

The Pharaoh frowned and questioned, _"You mean like when Anubis was awakened? Maybe..."_

Yugi looked slightly worried. 'Nah, it's just probably this tomb's old magic, you know?' Yet he didn't seem to have even convinced himself either. 'Anyway, we all sort of got separated again, but we're fine now...sort of. Did you happen to see what happened?' he asked.

_"Hmmm. No, that's when I started to worry, I couldn't get through then. Tell me, have you found an exit yet?"_ Yami asked hopefully.

Yugi laughed nervously. 'No, not yet. Um...hey, you wouldn't by any chance still be able to use your magic in here, would you?'

Yami shook his head. _"I couldn't get through to you through the link, much less use magic."_

The other nodded. 'Alright. Oh, by the way, mind not yelling so loudly next time? You're going to leave me deaf one of these days!'

Yami sweat-dropped. _"Sorry, I'll keep that in mind next time."_

Disconnecting, Yugi found himself being carried in midair and a pair of spiders clawing at his legs. "Nice to have you back, Yug!" Joey greeted, being the one who was dragging him.

"Guess what Yugi! We finally found the exit!" Tea said, going starry eyed.

"Really?"

Duke nodded. "We aren't that far from the cave actually! Tea found a tunnel leading back to the top!"

At this, the blonde grinned, boasting as he said, "I even went up to check it myself!"

"Only after you lost in our rock, paper, scissors game!" Tristan sneered.

"Anyway, now we can get out of here!" Tea led the conversation away before Joey could lash out. Tristan was too busy navigating to notice the quarrel though.

Yugi and Bakura laughed nervously, seemingly the only ones to who have noticed. "Except that Kaiba's still missing!"

This resulted in the other four to falter in smiling, their moods changing drastically. "Where is he?" they demanded, managing to also catch Tristan's attention at this news.

"Would you believe us if we told you we didn't know?"

The other four pulled at their hair in frustration. "It's always him!"

* * *

At the top of the temple...

The brunette collapsed to his hands and knees as he wearily managed to reach the top.

Looking around, Kaiba idly noted that behind the altar stand in front of him was a hall entrance. "That must be the exit," he breathed hopefully, never once thinking that he would be glad to see anything that resembled a tomb.

At least then he knew he was somewhere in the Snow Mountain Resort, unlike this place...

Kaiba took an abrupt stand and was suddenly distracted by the black jar sitting on the stand. Curiously, he pondered on whether to open it, merely wanting know what it contained inside. 'I wonder...'

But the jar's polished surface reflected the image of twelve mirrors, and so this immediately shifted his attention.

"How did they get here?" he wondered.

Fortunatelyhe caught himself, he needed to control his sense of curiosity.

Not wanting to waste any more time in that place, the boy fixed his attention back to the entrance, but the sudden appearance of a cloaked figure startled him out of his mind.

"Welcome, Seto," greeted the man. He sounded strangely familiar, but he couldn't quite pinpoint it.

'Freak,' Seto thought as he calmed down from the scare.

"Ahem," the stranger coughed indignantly, his left eye flashing menacingly. "You should show more respect towards your elders, young man."

Kaiba muffled a snort,getting back into business mode. "Yeah, whatever. Look, I'm in a bit of a hurry, so if you don't mind..." He repositioned his backpack and waited for the cloaked man step out of his way.

But the man stood his ground.

"I'd like to leave, today! Now move before I make you myself!"

"I am afraid you will not be leaving any time soon son," the man stated, removing the hood over his head.

Kaiba honestly wished the man hadn't, for it revealed an unnaturally hideous aging face. His dishelved white hair only making him seem more...lunatic looking.

But what unnerved Kaiba the most was that Millennium Eye of his, the one he had replaced his left eye with. It kept glowing an eerie gold, and the boy knew exactly what it was doing.

"Hey, you're that crazy geezer who killed the Blue Eyes girl," Kaiba pointed out dumbly.

The old man was insulted and disappointed to say the least. Frowning he said, "After so many millennias, that is the first thing you have to say to me, Seto?"

The brunette's right eye twitched in annoyance, and he harshly admonished, "No one, and I mean _no one,_ calls me by my first name but family. You got that?"

The man laughed, "Even after all these years you still have not changed son," but then abruptly stopped. "Which is not necessarily a good thing."

Seto's eyes narrowed, he suddenly had a great loathing for this man and he didn't even know him. The feeling then bubbled to a new height at the recollection of that girl's death. The one from the memory world, as Yugi had called it.

Yet Kaiba,being the composed person he was, ignored the man and kept silent.

"I am your father, whether you remember that or not, and I deserve the utmost respect from you boy," stated the old man.

"Please, my father died six years ago, alright? Five thousand year old relatives don't count in this time and age, so go complain to someone who cares to hear your story. Now, I'm not going to repeat myself again, get out of my way!" Kaiba ordered.

But the man had been waiting five millennias for this moment and his own son was not going to ruin his plans by being his stubborn self.

Valuable time was trickling by...

* * *

As the group neared the cavern like part of the tomb everyone suddenly stopped. Seeing as they were momentarily given a break from the creepy spiders.

"Wait guys, we still need to find Kaiba," Yugi reminded, Joey placing him down on the ground.

"What?" the other four cried.

Yugi and Bakura covered their ears, the latter saying, "Yugi's right, we still need to find him. I mean, that is the reason why we got lost in the first place, right? To find Kaiba, wasn't it? Or did I miss something?" Bakura asked in confusion.

Tea huffed. "But Kaiba's an ungrateful spoiled brat who, as he claims, is smart. So he won't have a problem finding the exit himself," she stated heatedly.

Joey and the others nodded. "You saw him, he didn't even thank us for coming to help him!" Tristan said.

"So why even bother? He says he doesn't need our help so he doesn't need our help," Duke chimed in.

Yugi and Bakura frowned, but nonetheless sent a hopeful glance towards Joey. But he was, of course, the one who most despised the brunette.

What were they expecting?

"That snob's a jerk! He never helps anyone but himself, so now the favor's being returned!"

"So you guys are just going to leave him here then?" Yugi questioned. What had gotten into his friends lately? The quartet nodded. "Even if it means losing Mokuba as a friend?"

This seemed to crash on them like a ton of bricks, but they nodded nonetheless. Although they seemed a little less certain this time.

Tristan then brought a knowledgeable fact up. "Okay, so we're being plain childish, but come on! This is Kaiba for crying out loud! The one who doesn't believe in the supernatural even if his life depended on it! He's in a tomb full of magic, spiders, and other things, so what makes you think he's even alive?"

This took them a moment to consider before Bakura answered, "Well, he was alive when we bumped into him last time, so why shouldn't he be alive now?"

The other four had expected this question though. "Yeah, but whatever it was that took you three, it was obviously after one of you. And seeing as you two are here and Kaiba isn't, it was after him. So we don't really know if he's actually in this realm or not. He might have even been eaten by those spiders," Duke explained.

Tea released a miserable sigh. "Even if we find him, it's highly probable that one or two of us won't make it out alive. So wouldn't it be better with less casualties?"

Yugi and Bakura didn't respond.

They knew they were in the right. Their friends were probably being cruel, but they were just stating the harsh truth as it was.

"Now then, I guess it's up to you guys. Are we going to go look for him or not?" Joey asked, unnaturaly serious. At that exact same moment the sounds of the spiders' screeching echoed not too faraway.

Nervously glancing at each other, both boys had sullenly agreed and continued towards the exit.

* * *

Please send all questions, comments, criticisms to the e-mail address on my bio page. Check my bio for update information. Thank you!

Copyright (C) 2004 by Rune-Sorceress. All rights reserved.


	7. Shards Of Undying Darkness

**The High Priest's Secret Tomb****

* * *

**

**Disclaimer:** I do not own **'Yu-Gi-Oh!'** Kazuki Takahashi, Warner Brothers, 4Kids Entertainment, and etc. does.

**Chapter:** Shards Of Undying Darkness

* * *

With a dignified voice, the old man got to the point. "You have come here t-," but he was rudely cut off.

"Not out of my own free will though," Kaiba snidely interrupted.

The man scowled. "As I was saying. You have come here tonight to choose to walk on the path of your destiny, Seto," he stated.

Again, the teen's right eye twitched. "It's Kaiba to you, old man!" Huffing in irritation, he asked, "What is it with you Egyptian freaks always trying to tell me what my destiny is, anyway?"

"You will respect your elders, especially your father!" the man's right eye narrowed.

But Kaiba didn't seem to have heard him as he ranted, "I've told Yugi and Ishizu this countless of times before, but they still don't seem to get it through their thick heads. _I make my own destiny_. Even after they witnessed firsthand that their beliefs on destiny are a bunch of baloni, they still continue to blab themselves to death! So if you're going start that I'm destined for, I don't know, whatever you brought me here for, then I suggest you save your breath."

The old man's fists tightened in anger. "How dare you insult our origin's beliefs!" he shouted and raised his hand, nearly blasting the boy down the stairs with a dark gust of dark power. "That will teach you to speak of things you have no knowledge of!"

Touching his forehead, he felt blood trickle down the side of his face. Kaiba grit his teeth, not because of the pain, but because of how furious he was. Reaching into his backpack, he took one of the grappling hooks out and angrily threw it at the old man.

Clearly hitting his target, the man did not yell out in pain as Kaiba had expected. Instead the man calmly took the hook out of his chest and threw it aside. "Has no one taught you that the dead cannot be killed twice?"

Glaring at the man, Kaiba knew the hook wasn't going to do anythingto him. It was only for his sense of satisfaction.

Placing his gloved hand back onto his injured part of the forehead, Kaiba's renewed vigor had vanished and so he gave the older man a look that clearly said, _"Well, what are you waiting for? Get on with your history lessons already!" _Yet he stayed seated on the floor to rest for now.

"Very well then, where should I start...?"

"How about at the end, where you died?" Seto suggested in mock good-nature.

Walking up to him, the stranger looked as if ready to slap him, but merely grabbed the Ring around his neck and his backpack, accidentally dropping the camera along the way. He took the Millennium Rod out as he walked back to block the exit, saying, "You have already acquired an Item. For someone who does not believe in magic, I am impressed."

Seto retrieved the video camera, he was going to get out, and when he did he was going to give the film to his brother.

But still, he didn't see the boy's fascination with dead mummies and tombs! It certainly wasn't a blast being possessed by a dead mummy either... "Well...? I don't have all life to sit around and wait you know?"

The man slowly turned. "For starters, I am known as high priest Akunadin..."

* * *

"Come on, we're almost there!" Tea gasped as they jumped into the freezing water.

"It's c-cold!" Bakura exclaimed.

Everyone swam to the middle of the lake, the spiders not daring to follow them any further. "Where's the exit?" Yugi asked.

"Over there, see it?" Tristan pointed over to a far left wall, a tunnel like opening going upwards at the very top of it.

"Uh, guys...?" Duke interrupted warningly. The spiders were climbing onto the ceiling over their heads, creating spider web lines. They slowly began to descend as they tried grabbing at them like a crane game with their claws.

With yelps they dived under the water to escape. Joey looked around and after a while spotted a water cavern. Surfacing to the top of the hidden cavern, they all took deep breaths of air. "Now what...do we...do?" Tea asked.

"We're obviously going to have to pass them one by one," Tristan started, but Yugi interrupted him.

"Are you insane? We can't do that!"

"But if we all go together, the spiders would have already gotten their creepy claws on one of us! We're too many to go at the same time, man."

"True."

"And besides," Joey warned, "...the tunnel's really long and slippery. Trust me, I should know, pal."

"Hey, did you hear that?" Bakura asked, looking around the water, but found nothing.

His friends' gazes too wandered about the small alcove. The water was moving, which meant something else was inside the lake with them. At the bottom, through the alcove's exit, they caught sight of a shadow of a small part of a tail or fin.

"Probably just a small fish, don't worry," Tristan laughed, but not convincing himself of that in the lest.

The thing swam a great distance in one stroke for it to be a fish, much less a small fish.

Tea frowned. "Hey guys, what happened to that thing we heard when we first slipped in here?" she asked. None of the other three answered, now pale and too scared to come out of the cavern.

"What?" Yugi inquired.

"Oh, nothing! We just heard something else swimming with us the first time too," explained the blonde nonchalantly.

They stayed a bit longer, trying to catch up on the events that took place during the small amount of time they had been separated. "Hey, Yugi? Your watch didn't happen to say 7:00 p.m., did it?" Duke queried, only to receive a nod from the boy.

Again, they fell silent.

"Let's just go. If we make it, we make it. If we don't, then..." Joey shrugged and took a dive under the water. The others followed suit, slightly dreading what they would see when they resurfaced.

But the spiders were long gone now.

They sighed in relief, yet immediately stopped as something swam their way. "Eeehhh! I thought the coast was clear!" Joey cried, taking the lead as everyone swam in the opposite direction of which the fish was headed.

Now they knew the eleven foot wide silhouette in the water was not a fish.

* * *

Kaiba nodded. "Mmhmm, well, if we're done here? I really have to get going now," he informed, standing up and getting ready to start walking.

"Hold it! We are not done talking! So sit or stand, but you are not going anywhere. It seems as though you need a bit of a reminder of your past life." The old spirit had a bit of time to spare before the ceremony, in the meantime he would fill his son in on things.

Seto tapped his foot impatiently on the ground, then looked at his watch as if though he had an important meeting to be in.

"My broth-," Akunadin started.

"WHAT? This thing is broken!" Kaiba exclaimed.

The high priest's right eye twitched. "What is it now boy?" he demanded.

"My watch, it's broken! It can't be 9:30 p.m. because I fell asleep at around 10:00 at night!"

The albino headed man scowled, saying, "We have more important things at hand than how long you overslept!"

But Seto looked as if the end of the world was coming as he tried finding something at fault with the contraption. "I do not oversleep! Especially for _24 hours!_"

His father was beginning to get exasperated, and had finally sent the wristwatch a blast of dark power. "Now you need not fuss over some silly little thing," he stated.

"You broke my watch!" Kaiba cried hysterically. Sure he could buy a new one, but he had had that one for the longest time.

"You said it was already broken! Anyway, you only overslept because a sleeping spell was cast over you and your bunch of friends."

"They aren't my friends,"Kaiba muttered stubbornly.

Akunadin massaged his temple and shouted, "Silence!" and Seto sat back down on the stone floor. The old man muttered under his breath...but continued his lecture.

"My elder brother was one of the previous Pharaohs in Ancient Egypt. I, being his right hand man. Hm, some would tell you that he was a fair ruler and indeed he was...but he was unreasonably fair. He was too kind and merciful to people who did not deserve to live. That was not very befitting of a King," he scorned derisively.

"I, with permission of the Pharaoh, created the seven Millennium Items you have come to know quite well, for protection. But to create them, one had to sacrifice a certain amount of souls to complete the spell. Of course, I did not inform the Pharaoh of this requirement. So, choosing a certain village's people,I set the ritual into action. Unfortunately, one little pest escaped, it had not mattered to me then, for I had all that I needed."

The old man scowled. "This pest has come to obtain the title as the King of the Shadows, you know him as _Bakura_, though?"

"Actually, I've come to know him as Jeckyll and Hyde," Kaiba replied simply and honestly.

"Either way, I did not see you again until nine years later, at the Palace. By then you had grown into a gifted and talented high priest," Akunadin praised. Then disappointedly added, "Unfortunately, you were hardheaded and quite the oblivious one as well."

Kaiba glared daggers. Nobody insulted him, whether it be a direct or an indirect insult towards him.

"Yes, it is a pity that all bright people are cursed with such faults. What is even worse is that you still have not changed much over the millennias." The old man heaved a long sigh. "You always believed that I had died in war for our country... Hn, then that boy came in and took the throne after his foolish father. The throne that rightfully belonged to you, son!"

Seto sighed. "Whatever." But his father continued without paying him any mind at all.

"As you grew older though, you began looking for greater magic, one that could surpass that of the three guardian Gods. I soon found out though, that they were not for your own gains, but indeed for the protection of the Palace."

Kaiba gave him no response.

"Then you met that girl, I forget her name though." Akunadin gave the brunette a long stare, trying in vain to read his mind for some information. Oddly enough, he could not see a thing but a bright light.

The boy just gave him a dull blank look.

'Impossible!' Akunadin mentally growled. 'Ugh! Well...no matter, I will make sure to banish her once and for all this time.' And then he snapped back to attention as he noticed his son's growing lack of attention.

"Call her what you desire, all I knew was that she was the Ka holder of the White Dragon. Yet know this, you would have become the strongest being the world had ever known if she had only minded her own business. Death was her punishment for ruining everything for you on that fateful day, this includes your cousin's death as well."

Kaiba by now was half listening, half sleeping.

"Boy, are you even listening?" he demanded.

"Yes, I am and I already know what happened too. You killed her, the priest killed you, you possessed him, blah, blah, blah, the end. Can I go now?" Kaiba ended rapidly.

"No! There is still more you do not know! That girl possessed you, not me! I had merely gone in to save you from her, but she was able to banish me before I could do so!"

"Right, except I was there and pretty much saw the whole scenario, idiot."

Akunadin was stock still in mounting rage by now, especially after the last comment. 'How did he come to obtain such information? ...He seems to have gotten smarter and unmendable than he was five millennias ago. But...that did not stop me then and it will most certainly not stop me now!' he thought.

"Choose now son! Pick the right path and you will live what was taken from you so long ago! Pick the wrong path and suffer the consequences!" commanded the old man, dragging Kaiba by the collar of hisjacket to the center of the altar.

Forcibly dropping him in a heap there, he swiftly opened the black jar of liquid and poured its contents on the boy's head.

"Hey! Ugh, blood? From what exactly, may I ask?" Kaiba demanded indignantly.

"Demons..." was all Akunadin gave him before falling silent, awaiting for midnight to come before he could start reciting the words on the stone tablet.

* * *

"What's happening?" Yugi shouted, now swirly eyed from all the water's spinning.

The huge fish like monster had been headed towards them and would have gobbled them up in one gulp if they hadn't accidentally slipped through a small opening on one of the cave's walls.

This wasn't necessarily a good thing because everyone had now fallen into a spinning whirlpool. It was taking all of their strength just to stay above the water's surface.

"Waterfall at twelve o' clock!" Duke warned, but by then they were plummeting downwards.

Yet somehow managing to grab a climbable platform under the waterfall at the last second, everyone had gotten up safe and sound, they had a few scratches here and there, but nothing too serious.

"Do you think it was that Leviathan?" Joey asked, referring to the giant splash they all heard. His friends only stared at Joey in utter confusion. Leviathan? "What? I have to label things I don't know the names to!" he defended.

Looking over the rapidly falling water, all they could see was more blue water. "Where did it go?" Yugi whispered frantically.

To their left were rocky stones which they could use to climb back up. To their right though were huge green eyes. Blinking once, the owner of the eyes opened its mouth to gobble Joey's head off.

"Huh? I didn't know it could walk on walls too!" the blonde shouted, Tristan pulling him out of harm's way. "Eeehhh!" Joey nearly had a heart attack at the loud inhuman screech that came from the Leviathan.

No one stopped to catch their breaths, now merely running on adrenalin.

Upon reaching the cavern with the whirlpool, Tristan took a quick look around and said, "If we stay close to the edge over there by the wall, we should be just fine." But just as he finished, a shadow soon loomed above them and jumped one of them.

"Tea!"

Tea was dropped to the ground, wrestling the thing's mouth away from her shoulder before Yugi got a good aim and knocked the thing over the head with his Puzzle.

The creepy crawler, as Joey was incoherently repeating over and over, collapsed on the poor girl's head. "Ew, ew, ew!" She slipped away to the side, kicking the thing into the water in the process. She continuously dusted herself, disgusted.

"You alright, Tea?" her friends asked in worry.

"Yeah, just scarred for life by skinless things is all," she murmured.

* * *

While at the altar...

Kaiba was and had been trapped in a prison like shield for the quite some time, so he definitely wasn't having the best time of his life. For try as he might, he could find no way out of his predicament.

Punching didn't work, kicking was out of the question, and tackling hadn't worked either. So there he was, sitting as he boredly glanced at his watch for the umpteenth time that day.

Kaiba had noticed that his watch was still in working condition moments ago, the beeping was all that seemed to be malfunctioning, and so would glance at the time often. He mentally noted that it was twelve in the morning on the dot.

The teen had never gone so long without doing something and so this was what he considered pure torture.

As he leaned back in his prison, Kaiba didn't even bother asking the old man what he was doing reciting gibberishwords. He dreaded he would get another excruciatingly long lecture, again. That was worse of a punishment than doing nothing in his opinion.

_"Twelve Mirrors, I call forth the Twelve Beasts of the __Shadows,_

_come and set this poor soul right._

_Cleanse this unworthy mortal to a new light of destiny._

_If he so wishes to go astray then by the powers invested in __the Guardians,_

_eclipse his mind, heart, and soul in utter darkness._

_Betrayed by his golden sun as he arises to greater power imaginable to_

_conquer the evil on this earth!_

_Free your allies from their sealed confines, they who are scattered into the four corners_

_Obscures!"_

"It has finally been fulfilled!" Akunadin laughed in malice and pride.

Kaiba stared on in bewilderment. He didn't even want to know what the senile man was so happy about. He knew it would be nothing of good news to him in the end anyway.

"I feel sorry for anyone and everyone who's related to this oddball freak," mumbled the brunette.

Akunadin's eye narrowed. "Watch your tongue boy!"

Seto crossed his arms, "Make m- ah!" and fell to the ground as the prison vanished from behind him.

His father was not amused, his sour expression hardening as he paced back and forth in front of the catwalk that led to the tomb's entrance. "Have you chosen your road yet?" he inquired.

Kaiba raised an eyebrow.

"The road you will walk to your destiny on, of course."

Kaiba could tell the high priest was suppressing a triumphant smirk and so dully asked, "What's the deal? I know you're hiding something."

"Son of mine,"

"Kaiba! How many times do I have to go through this?"

"...you have two choices," the man continued. "Your first choice is to join me in your succession to the throne which was unfairly taken from you. You shall have complete rule over the shadows and swallow this world into a new dark era!"

Kaiba was now standing, hand on chin as if though deep in thought, nodding his head now and then.

"Or two, you can ignore your destiny and go through this the difficult way. Enduring horrible past memories and heartaches, along with head games which will slowly break your soul."

Kaiba was still seemingly deep in thought, in truth he was just really humoring the old man.

'Once he makes his choice I will secretly banish that girl from his mind,' Akunadin thought.

Then Kaiba finally answered, "What's the difference between choices one and two? They're indirectly the same thing!"

"Nothing really, one is just a much easier step in willingly accepting the darkness."

"And two...?"

"And two is a harder step in unwillingly accepting the darkness."

Seto stared incredulously at the cloaked man. "How is that two choices? It's just one choice!" he exclaimed, only to receive a shrug.

Akunadin was twirling something in his hands and stepped aside, holding the object out to him.

A shiny aqua blue orb lay on his palm.

"You may leave, but keep in mind that it is just the same as going astray. Or accept this orb and store all the light of your soul in here."

Kaiba briefly glanced at the entrance to his freedom...sort of. He recalled the part about going astray and suffering the consequences, not that he believed that bunch of baloni. Well, not entirely.

'He's bluffing,' he thought, suspiciously glaring over at the geezer. '...or maybe his little contraption doesn't work anymore.'

With a small huff, the brunette walked over to the outstretched hand. He would take it, but only under a few circumstances.

Now was his chance...

* * *

In a room at the lodge...

Ms. Dian's footsteps receded as she stopped her constant pacing around her room. Wringing her hands together a knock at the door startled her out of her reverie.

"Come in!" she said, clearing her throat.

Mrs. Haiahashi entered, a small frown gracing her face. "We just sent a rescue team to go and search for the kids, but the head of the Search Department is asking for pictures and more information on the seven," stated the red headed instructor.

The blonde teacher choked her coffee out in sputters.

"He said it was mandatory for the parents of the children to know ofthe situation, but only if they didn't turn up within 24 more hours," her friend quickly added.

The distressed Ms. Dian collapsed on her desk chair and grudgingly retrieved the required files out of her laptop. "Don't worry, they'll find them," Mrs. Haiahashi assured, at which her friend silently nodded as her thanks. "I'll be in the cafeteria if you need me, alright?"

"Sure...thanks."

With that, the instructor shut the door.

Ms. Dian continued extracting the seven files as she thought, 'I'm going to laugh my head off when I look back on this day years later, but for now...it's the end of the world! And this day won't even be funny years later if they don't find those seven!'

* * *

"Come on, we're almost there!" Joey cheered sullenly.

"Yeah," everyone sighed.

"Are you sure we shouldn't look for Kaiba first?" Tea asked. She and the others were beginning to have second thoughts on their decision.

"I don't know," Tristan admitted, scratching his head. "Because now that I think of it, Mokuba'll never forgive us if we don't at _least_ try. Hey, unless we're cold enough to ignore him, which I know I'm not."

"Tristan's right...for once. Ow!" Duke cried and glared at his attacker. Tea had hit him over the head.

Yugi and Bakura sighed in relief, so their friends hadn't gotten possessed by evil spirits! "What are we waiting for then? Let's go look for him!" Yugi cheered.

And everyone set back down the rocky platforms. "You know, I'm beginning to feel a lot better now," Tea sighed, the other three nodding along.

"I'm going to talk to Yami, maybe he can try and locate Kaiba's Rod," suggested the spiky headed boy.

'Yami?'

_"Hm, wha-? Something wrong, Yugi?"_ Yami's voice filtered the astral plane.

'No, everything is fine and dandy. Actually...we wanted to know if you could try and locate Kaiba's Rod?' Yugi asked, quickly getting to the point. They had wasted more than enough time in that tomb and he wanted to get out just as badly as the others.

His counterpart's face looked uncertain. _"Hmmm, I don't know about that. If the powers from the tomb collide with mine, for even a split fraction, they could cause a tremendous explosion. Resulting in the collapsing of the tomb,"_ Yami stated.

Yugi's eyes widened. 'Oh...well. Let's hope that lady luck is on our side today then!' he cheered and stood stock still beside his alter ego.

The Pharaoh face faulted and gave the boy a disbelieving look, but tried nonetheless when he figured Yugi was being serious. And so one of themostanxiousmoments passed by in silence as the spirit concentrated his magic.

Finally, the silence was broken. _"I found something small of the Rod's aura...west is where you'll find Kaiba. Though I really don't think he's in this realm,"_ Yami huffed tiredly.

'What? You mean he's in the Shadow Realm?'

_"No, no, no. I meant a different place, but in the same place. It's sort of an oxymoron. I'm sorry, but I really can't help you here, Yugi."_

Sweat-dropping, Yugi waved it off. 'No problem, as long as we have at least one clue...thanks.'

Disconnecting, he found they were not being chased by spiders, crawlers, or Leviathans this time.

"So what'd he say?" his friends bombarded.

"He's still somewhere in the west area."

While Yugi looked around, making sure nothing was collapsing, Bakura got his compass ready and they were ready to set off. "This way everyone."

Yugi and his squad marched down the dark corridors, deciding to pick the pace up a bit after a while. Jogging along, they bumped into no spiders or any monsters at all for that matter.

* * *

Ms. Dian prolonged her nightmare come true as long as possible. All that was left of her career were 24 hours. She was beginning to panic now.

'What if they don't find them? What job will accept me? I'm only good at teaching and it's not like any other school will trust me with this! This is horrible!'

As she reached the first floor of the lodge, she headed for the lounge. It was taking all of her energy not to run back to her room and lock herself up with the information they needed.When she entered though,the blonde made it brisk andstepped up to the manager of the Search Department, grudgingly handing him the paper files.

"I'm deeply sorry for your misfortune Miss," the man stated sympathetically. She just nodded as he made his way out.

Her hair bounced with the small fall as she sat on a nearby chair. The teacher stared out the window at nothing in particular, hoping the seven would be found.

* * *

In the shadows of a morbid and dormant hall roamed a silent stranger. Fluidly passing by multiple doors on either side of her.

The doors were almost like well organized documents, each containing a particular piece of information the person held of high importance. The lone stranger came to a stop in front of the only open room at the very end of the corridor. It was equally as pitch black, but this hall held no doors.

Mirrors were what decorated the walls around the woman. She paid them no mind though, as she was on a journey to find only one particular door in that realm.

Her roaming finally came to an abrupt halt as she was greeted by a passageway leading either above ground or underground. She chose the bottom level staircase.

This was her destination.

To her left was an open doorway. It consisted mainly of a desktop piled with various objects, such as a laptop, a single green book, and three cards. Two familiar looking statues were placed on either side of the desk.

On the right side wall were multiple pictures of a light blue headed boy with gray eyes, two younger boys were standing next to him. Little trinkets like a golden box and a few pictures of a couple looking and pointing up at a starry night sky decorated the opposite wall.

The woman smiled before shifting her gaze away from the room to a closed door on her left side. It looked like a plain gray dungeon door, except this one had a golden eye in the middle.

'I found him...now I wonder what he will do,' she mentally wondered. Then cautiously pushing against the cold frame, she poked her head in for any sign of activity.

Not a soul.

But she wasn't worried. She was positive the person she had been searching for so long was just inside the door across the chamber. The stranger made her way across the dankroom when a new thought occurred to her. 'Let us have a small test. I want to see if he can see through this small facade...' she thought gleefully.

* * *

Akunadin smiled, a malicious glint in his eye as his son voluntarily reached out towards the orb. "What is the matter?" he asked a second later.

Kaiba's hand hovered just above the orb item. His eyes were staring at two other certain Items that the old man had in his possession. Yet the brunette was rudely startled out of his reverie by an unexpected and insistent ringing.

Both covered their ears in pain as Kaiba's watch continued beeping, going from a low pitch ring to an annoyingly high pitched screeching.

"What is...that?" Akunadin demanded. Kaiba was glaring at his watch when it was suddenly pulled away from his line of sight. Akunadin had taken the mechanism and thrown it down the altar stairs. "Despicable thing, interrupting an important moment like this. Go on son," he huffed, this day couldn't get any worse!

Kaiba scowled, that was his favorite watch! "You never did tell me _how_ you came back to life, did you? Aren't you four thousand years old or something like that?" he harshly questioned.

The older man sighed, "Can you not ask me _afterwards_, Seto?"

This only served to irritate the young man to no end as he grit his teeth to stop himself from blowing a gasket.

Akunadin had noticed this and, thinking his son was angry that he wouldn't answer his questions, quickly reprimanded himself. "I mean, there is no reason why I should not tell you, right?" he asked, but Kaiba did not respond. "Well, I am _five_ thousand years old to begin with, not four thousand," he corrected, going on to explain his return in detail.

"As for how I am here? Let us just say that I stored pieces of my soul inside three certain Item holders. When you all came to the mirror chamber, a spirit guarding the room gathered my soul and energy for me. This was when it cast that sleeping spell on you, which accounts for why you awoke so late."

"How did you get your body back?" Kaiba asked in forced interest. He wasn't paying much attention to the answer though.

The high priest smirked and replied, "The mirrors are a small reflection of the Shadow Realm...and you can never rid of the shadows. They were able to summon my body from there."

This passed by the CEO like silent air, he was more preoccupied and engrossed with his escape plans than the fool's blabber. It was now or never...

Kaiba had it over with in ten seconds as he gave Akunadin a forceful shove, grabbing the Rod from behind his cloak and pulling the Ring off his neck. Then, while his victim was paralyzed in shock, Kaiba brought the Rod down on the high priest's head.

A bright golden flash of light indicated that he had banished the old man back to whence he came from.

"Ha! Pathetic loser!" he shouted in triumph once more and picked the Millennium Eye off the ground.

He never did like the thing since the day he first witnessed its powers.

The orb slowly fell to the ground, unnoticed by the preoccupied brunette. As the orb made contact with the stone, an echoing ringing was heard all around. Millions of shattered pieces of glass shards exploded at Kaiba's feet. Everything went dead silent...

* * *

Meanwhile...

Yugi, Tea, Joey, Tristan, Bakura, and Duke all stopped dead in their tracks. The distant echo of breaking glass reached their alert ears.

"That sounded like breaking glass," Yugi whispered.

"Think Kaiba is trying to get rid of the mirrors?" Tea asked. Her reply were her friends' shrugs. Deciding to keep going was a bad idea on their part, for the next step they took forward made them feel a slight rumble as it spread throughout the tomb.

"That wasn't good," Joey whimpered, trying to drag the others back towards the cavern with their exit.

Another rumble took them by surprise. "We a-aren't above a v-volcano, are we?" Duke asked.

"No," Tea said, then startled the others with a yelp. "Oh no! If the place starts shaking like this then the tomb could collapse, including our exit!" she cried.

"WHAT? Then why are we standing here for? Let's go!" Joey hollered, the tomb giving a rougher shake as if in protest.

"What about Kaiba?" Tristan questioned.

"Now it's _really_ too late!"

With that said, the ground began to crumble behind them as they headed back to their exit.

* * *

The altar stairs were also threatening to throw Kaiba off into the abyss below if he tried moving, but he didn't care. He retrieved his backpack, quickly stuffing his things away.

Putting the Ring around his neck and the Eye in his pocket, Kaiba readied himself for the run of his life. But a few moments later the twelve mirrors in the circle had also shattered into a million bits of shards. They exploded out towards the middle of the circle like confetti of silver.

Kaiba covered his eyes from the assault, "Ah!" but one small shard had managed to dig itself a small way into his left shoulder...

* * *

Please send all questions, comments, criticisms to the e-mail address on my bio page. Check my bio for update information. Thank you!

Copyright (C) 2004 by Rune-Sorceress. All rights reserved.


	8. Great Escape

**The High Priest's Secret Tomb****

* * *

**

**Disclaimer:** I do not own **'Yu-Gi-Oh!'** Kazuki Takahashi, Warner Brothers, 4Kids Entertainment, and etc. does.

**Chapter:** Great Escape

* * *

Kaiba winced, feeling the sharp sting of the mirror's shard sink in, and he suddenly felt nauseous. He soon doubled over and threw up. What struck him most was that the fact that it tasted like blood, yet the liquid was black.

"I...didn't feel...sick a while...ago," he coughed, in the process hacking more blood out. His vision was blurring as hestepped through the entrance.

All he found was asingle staircase leading downwards...

...out of this chaos of a realm.

* * *

"Aaaahhh!" Yugi and his friends went jumping up and down in every corridor and chamber they entered.

"Why is the ground moving?" Joey wailed, when suddenly he tripped over a protruding piece of rock on the floor and hit the ground face first. "Ow, so unfair!" he moaned.

Yet even thoughthe ground continued to move and jump unevenly, Bakura kept a sunny smile on all the while. "Look on the bright side!" he said.

His friends turned to stare at him as if though he had grown a second head.

"At least those monsters aren't having the easiest time of their lives either!" he cheerfully pointed out.

Tea grinned. "Hey, that's true!"

But their happiness was short lived as their attention was focused back to the matter at hand. Everyone tried walking carefully through the ups and downs of a chamber, but itproved to be futile.

"Imagine trying to find Kaiba in this chaos!" Duke laughed miserably.

"Ow! Joey, watch it!" Tea yelped in pain.

"Sorry, didn't mean to step on your foot!" he quickly apologized.

All six were too busy fussing about hitting, bumping, or stepping on each other that they didn't notice a figure keeping a close eye on them.

* * *

A group of four adults trudged through the snow, squinting their eyes to get a better look through the raging snowstorm. It was possibly getting worse by the second.

"Where could they be?" a man in a white and blue uniform shouted wearily.

"I don't have the slightest idea!" the other man replied. The earth then began to give a few rough shake now and then.

"This area isn't known to have volcanoes or earthquakes!" a woman cried, bumping into one of her partners. "But honestly, these kids are smart! Wouldn't they seek for shelter?" she asked.

The fourth member nodded, blowing some of her brown hair out of her eyes. "How much food do they have again?"

The first guy thought for a moment before answering, "About four days' food, at the most!"

With a frustrated sigh, the brunette woman asked, "Don't any of them know how to use a compass?"

The others snorted. "Please, do kids ever listen to instructions?" And so they continued making their way against the raging winds, deciding it would be best to head towards the mountains instead.

"Let's split up! John and Kyla, go to the mountains on the left! Sam and I will take the ones to the right!" Shena informed.

Reluctantly going their separate ways, one group stumbled upon two items buried in the snow. "Look, two wallets!"

Meanwhile, the other two had managed to find another buried item as well. "So we're going in the right direction!" Sam stated.

* * *

Back in Domino City...

"Hmmhmm," hummed an old man, his graying spiky hair camouflaging with the background of coming rain clouds. He sighed. "It's so quiet without those little rascals around."

He continued sweeping outside his Game Shop when the mailman stopped beside him. "Ah, good morning Solomon. Is your grandson home today?" the man asked.

Mr. Mutou looked up from his work. "Good morning, Dan. No, I'm afraid he's not, but may I ask why?" he queried.

Dan smiled, getting out of his delivery truck and heading to the back, bringing asmall lockedbox out.

Mr. Mutou blinked. Who would send his grandson such a securely locked box anyway?

"Solomon, are you alright?" Dan asked him, snapping him out of his reverie.

"Hmmm? Oh yes! Just fine," Mr. Mutou assured.

After having had handed the box over, Dan hopped back inside his vehicle. With small waves to each other, Yugi's grandfather then entered the shop.

Gleefully, heruthlessly pried the box open. "Seeing as Yugi won't be home for another week or so, I'm sure he won't mind if I take a small peek inside."

With that in mind, he carefully proceeded in opening the box, almost immediately taking notice it was an artifact. "It's probably from Ishizu," he mumbled under his breath.

Inside he found...a golden scale.

Lifting out the letter next to it, Mr. Mutou went to get his reading glasses. "Ah, I was right, it is from Ishizu," and he read:

**_Dear Yugi,_**

_I am deeply sorry to keep bothering you like this, but we have just discovered that we are currently missing the Millennium Eye. I have tried using the powers of my Millennium Necklace to locate it, but it seems to have stopped working once again. __We have just spoken with Pegasus and he does not hold the Eye either. _

_Please keep an extra lookout for this person, they could be of extra threat with the Item in their possession. _

_In other news, Shadi has just discovered that the present owner of the Millennium Scale has passed away. So instead, we will be handing them down to your grandfather. _

_Again, my sincerest apologies for troubling you so, but I must tell you that our problems with the media will not be fixed until late November, at the earliest. _

_Oh yes, before I forget. I am warning you beforehand to stay away from spiders. Do not ask me why, that small glimpse of a prediction still eludes me._

**_Sincerely,  
Ishizu Ishtar_**

_**P.S.** Remember to wear something green on St. Patrick's Day and warn Joey, Tristan, and Duke to avoid Kaiba by all means necessary that whole day._

"Oh dear, it's too bad that they can't be warned anymore. Hmmm...so this thing is mine, huh?" Mr. Mutou said aloud. He took the Millennium Scale out and inspected it closely. "My, no wonder Yugi likes to carry his Puzzle around. They're very stylish, and now I can blend in with the trend too! I am still quite young after all!" he declared proudly.

Then he started doing some flashy karate moves with his hands and legs. "Ow! Maybe...I am...too old for this..." he groaned.

The old man held his back in pain, dropping the envelope in the process.

Three cards fell out onto the floor along the way...

He blinked, forgetting all about the pain on his back as he picked them up. Mr. Mutou had gone starry eyed when he got a good look at them. "The three Egyptian God cards!" he exclaimed in glee, then abruptly quieted down and went to lock the shop's door, turning the 'Opened' sign around.

He then set the card trio down on the counter and unfolded the note that was attached to one of them, reading:

_I thought you would need them, just in case anything came up. Take good care of them and I wish you luck should trouble arise._

* * *

Kaiba drowsily stumbled down the last steps of the staircase, relieved that the hurling had resided. "My head," he grunted, wishing he could just drop to the floor and fall asleep for just a tiny bit.

The idea that the Ring must locate those other weird Items idly crossed his mind before he finally grasped it.

He concluded that Yugi's Puzzle was the only Item left in the tomb, so the thing was obviously leading him back to the dorks. Kaiba was positive that they were bound to have found an exit by now. Yet this somehow did not change or enhance his walking agility, in fact, he couldn't even move any longer...

...and that was when he felt it. The feeling of no longer in control over any limb in his body, yet he was amazingly picking up speed now.

He was slipping, slipping into the dark, a temporary dormancy...

* * *

Meanwhile...

All the boys in the group urged Yugi to pick the pace up. "Come on Yug! Run faster!" Joey shouted as the spiders gained on the boy's heels.

"This _is_ as fast as I can run!" Yugi exclaimed.

Tea then thought back to when her friend had switched places with Yami, obviously the Pharaoh wasn't going to make much of a difference. So, taking matters into her own hands once more, the brunette lifted Yugi off the ground and carried him herself.

Everyone sweat-dropped. "Tea!" Yugi complained, a tinge of pink spreading across his face in embarrassment.

In the meantime, the guys were trying to suppress their laughing very subtly. This excluded Bakura, who was kind enough to stay quiet.

"I have two legs, I can run on my own!" he stated matter-of-factly.

Tea gave him a glare of annoyance as she said, "You didn't mind last time." This caused the other three to nearly fall over in laughter.

"That was Yami, that didn't count!" he yelled. Yugi was desperately trying to squirm out of her hold, the girl only rolled her eyes at his futile attempts. "Why me?" he asked, giving up in his escape with a weary sigh.

The guys' laughing abruptly stopped that Yugi worriedly snapped his head up to see what had happened. Tea was giving them the most venomous look...

The now nervously chuckling trio knew that look, which quite clearly told them, "If I hear one word, _one word_, about this, you three will be sorry!" The three boys merely gave her meek nods. In their eyes she seemed to be towering over them. Her evil eyes boring through them as she held onto the helpless rag doll Yugi.

Bakura, meanwhile, was immensely enjoying himself, mainly because he wasn't in trouble.

"There, all settled, Yugi," Tea informed. But the semi short boy had already turned extra chibi in her arms, putting the reddest tomato to shame.

Finally they all arrived to the water cavern, not wasting any time in swimming across to the jagged platform wall. The rocks were now tumbling down like falling snow, but they were sure the exit would hold for a little longer. "We're almost there guys!" Tristan shouted over his shoulder.

"Yeah! Woohoo!"

Everyone suddenlyfroze in mid-cheering. Yugi's eyes swiftly darted to the tunnel like hole that led into this chamber.

Someone or something was sliding down and was likely to come after them. Yet they were somehow compelled to stay rooted on the spot...

...and before they knew it, out of the blue, Kaiba's figure slipped out and plunged into the icy water.

"Kaiba!" Yugi and his friends called out in horror and relief. He had yet to resurface the water so they could see how he was doing. They stared on as the water was soon tainted with blood.

Kaiba finally awoke, only to find himself sinking to the abyss like bottom of the cold lake.He nearly gagged as he breathed some water in.

His colbat eyes lazily looked about his surroundings, not recalling how he had gotten there, only that he had fallen into a sort of slumber like state at some point. Squinting his eyes to try and see who the approaching figure was, Kaiba immediately decided that swimming back up would do his lungs some good.

Joey and Tristan were just about to jump into the lake before Kaiba resurfaced all of a sudden. Startling most of them out of their wits.

"Gee, we thought you forgot to swim or something!" the blonde shouted. And although Kaiba was greatly disoriented, the boy had enough grace to send him a deadly glare in warning. "Yeah, yeah! Hurry up already, man! We found an exit!"

Duke looked around at the still collapsing tomb. "Then what are we waiting for? Let's get going!" he suggested anxiously. The raven haired teen motioned Tea forward, indicating that she be the first to get out. The girl was then closely followed by Yugi before Bakura made his way up afterwards.

Meanwhile, Kaiba was drowsily making his way over to the group, quite slowly, purposely done on his part. He would rather die before giving away that he was actually glad to have found them all. This was when he noticed that something else was swimming in the water besides him.

"Sheesh, man! What dump did you jump into?" Tristan's exclamation interrupted his thought process.

"What is _that_ supposed to mean?" Kaiba countered, abruptly taking to the offense. His two remaining roommates only stared at him, making Kaiba look at himself.

His jacket was thoroughly soaked in blood.

When the brunette could not recall what had happened he just shrugged, it wasn't like he would have told them even if he knew to begin with.

Tristan, having grown impatient with the young man, harshly pulled Kaiba out of the water and shoved him towards the tunnel above them. "You're up next!" he ordered.

Lesson to be learned when with the CEO: never _ever_ touch Seto Kaiba, unless you want your head ripped off.

"Touch me again Taylor and you'll find yourself armless in ten seconds!" Kaiba threatened, turning a menacing scowl his way.

Joey fidgeted, as he was the man in the middle at the moment. Duke had already gone. "Um, hehe. Maybe I'll just go next, since, you know..." the blonde laughed, clambering up to the tunnel.

"Some friend," Tristan mumbled.

But no matter, he wasn't one bit afraid of the teen before him. So what if Kaiba was the multibillionaire of Kaiba Corp.? What made him any different from any of the rest, other than his riches?

Seto was completely undaunted by the glare being sent his way. "Is there a problem, Taylor?" he asked in his frighteningly calm tone.

Alright, so maybe he was just a _tad_ bit intimidated. "Uh, no. Just wondering how you're going to handle them with sprained limbs and everything." Tristan pointed at the gathering creatures behind them.

"That'll be _my_ business to worry about, alright?" Kaiba ended his case then and there. Tristan obligingly clambered up to the exit then.

The skinless like human pets crawled on the walls, three new spiders joining them, as Kaiba made a face at the horrid sight. He too was now in the tunnel, turning to take a look at the monsters but once more before his sight was blocked by rocks from the inside of the tomb.

The boy technically considered himself now _outside_ the tomb.

All would have been relatively well, he would have enjoyed making his way out if _only_ his brain would give him a rest for once in a long while! He sighed, his thoughts drifting to their own conclusions.

'For starters,' he began, '...the exits were wide open for anyone or anything come in and out of. What should happen if some of them are already outside at this very moment?' Kaiba ended in horror.

True, the spiders and Leviathans were too big to fit through the exits, but the creepy crawlers were just the perfect size. Not to mention that they were able to climb walls with fluid ease...

Seto was cut short on his new discovery when he felt hands grab the back of his jacket. "Yeah, yeah, you'll rip our arms off in ten seconds, we know!" the six friends laughed.

He was pulled out the last few feet by the Yugi squad, much to his annoyance and relief, he was exhausted.

When he stood up was when everyone ran out of the cave in unison. A cliff was up ahead of them, but that stopped no one from jumping down the rocky and slippery path of the high mountain.

If they died, they were going down running as far as possible from the mountain.

* * *

"Did they find them?" Ms. Dian asked, taking nervous glances out her room's balcony window.

Mr. Haiahashi shook his head, saying, "No, but they did find these. The manager wants to know if they belong to any of the missing students."

Taking the three items from him, the woman gave them each a thorough look, nodding along. "Yes, these are the items of three of them. The yellow wallet is Joseph's, the red one is Tea's, and I believe the necklace is Mr. Kaiba's," she stated, trying in vain to open the card like necklace. Her teeth grit together in held in irritation, as she started slamming the poor locket onto a table.

"How does that boy open it?" Ms. Dian growled, "Why won't you open?"

The male instructor backed away from his friend, nervously inching his way towards the door. Unfortunately the door suddenly opened then, hitting the man in the face.

"Oh! I'm so sorry, dear!" his wife apologized, stepping inside and looking over at a raging Ms. Dian, who was stomping on a necklace.

Once Ms. Dian finally had all her anger vented out onto that single item, which was still in mint condition, she gave her full attention to the two.

"Um, feeling better now?"

"Ha! Yes, much better," she sighed, "...but anyway, these are their things."

The red headed womantook the items back. "At least they're looking in the right place. Who knows, they probably found shelter in a cave. They'll be fine," she comforted.

* * *

Above the tomb...

Having run a good _long_ distance away from the mountain they had previously escaped, everyone had hit the ground and had covered their heads. The shaking subsideduntil only the howling winds from the snowstorm were left.

Warily standing up, the group of friends waited in silence for a few minutes before jumping into the air, dancing and hugging each other in celebration. "We actually made it out!" they cried disbelievingly.

"Come on, let's all get to the lodge! Warm food is better than wet and cold food any day!" Tristan cheered, tears of happiness pouring down in buckets.

"Yeah! Now, which way is north?" Joey asked in eager excitement.

Yugi took his compass out. "North is...that way!" he stated. And so everyone joined hands to start their long delayed journey back to the lodge's refuge.

Duke then waved his hand behind him, searching for Kaiba's hand. "Kaiba, grab my hand!" he yelled over his shoulder, but turning he found no one. "Um...I don't mean to be the party pooper again, but we're kind of missing Kaiba again!" he informed the others.

Everyone froze.

"No! How could he have gotten lost so fast?" Tea wailed in despair.

Joey merely laughed, saying, "And he calls _me_ a dog? He's the one constantly getting lost that we should probably keep a dog leash on him or something!"

But the others were only growing headaches. "What do we do? Should we look for him?" Tristan sighed, "This is what got us nearly killed last time after all!"

Yugi and his friends looked indecisively at each other, but soon shrugged it away. They would dig and look through the snow to see if they had any luck.

Yet in the endtheir attempts ended in vain.

"We better get going before we freeze to death!" Tea said, and the six stiffly, not to mention guiltily, headed off towards the lodge.

'Yami?' Yugi chattered.

_"Ah Yugi, have you found an exit yet? I thought I felt a surge of power explode somewhere, I hope that wasn't me. And what about Kaiba...?"_ the spirit bombarded anxiously. He was more concerned with the surge of power he had felt, hoping he wasn't the cause of some form of explosion in the tomb.

His counterpart shook his head. 'Hm, we're already out of the tomb, as for the surge of power, I have no idea what you're talking about. And well, we found Kaiba for a little while...then we sort of lost him when we got out of the tomb...'

Yami nodded knowingly. _"You want me to relocate the Rod again?"_ he questioned.

'It depends...can you locate things even through storms?'

The Pharaoh gave a slight frown. _"That could be a problem..., but I'll see what I can do anyway,"_ he offered.

The alter ego took a deep, concentrating breath in. Becoming quiet for a few tense minutes as he searched for said Rod's location. Of course, his powers had a limited distance they could travel before he became too exhausted to continue. _"Sorry,"_ he sighed.

Yugi scratched his head, now out of ideas. 'Don't worry about it, he'll be fine, I think,' he said and disappeared from his sight with a small shrug.

Disconnecting, Yugi found the others waiting expectantly. "Anything?" Bakura asked.

"No, the storm is too strong!" Yugi informed.

Looking disappointed the group started backtracking once more towards the lodge. "How long do you think it is from here to the lodge?" Tea asked.

"Well, let's see! We traveled one maybe two miles with the instructors. We must have traveled more than two miles in that tomb, so I would guess around four or five miles!" Tristan replied.

This further dampened their exuberance as they struggled on through the storm. No one spoke much, except to check if everyone was tired or alright every now and then.

* * *

Further away...

Shaking the snow off of his dampened hair, Kaiba stood up for what he felt had to be the umpteenth time.

"Well, now I'm back to where I started from, lost without a compass," he heaved wearily. "Hmph, but one thing's for sure, I'll die of cold before I try and find any form of shelter ever again."

The Millennium Ring then suddenly pulled him forward, causing him to fall into the snow, again. Spitting chunks of snow out, Kaiba noted that it was pointing him towards a nearby Millennium Item.

"Maybe it's that weird Puzzle thing or whatever, again," he muttered, his smirk widening as he recalled that Yugi _did_ have a compass and was probably already heading north.

Perfect.

Kaiba soon set off in the direction the Ring led him towards, trudging over lumps of rocks hidden underneath the snow.

A cloaked figure appeared out of thin air on the cliffs above the brunette's head. The man's apathetic colbat eyes carefully studied the boy from a distance.

'Seto Kaiba, so we meet again. Hmmm, so it is he whom holds the stolen Items now is it...?' the man thought in doubt. His eyes narrowed and he vanished into a black warp like realm.

The stranger needed to have a word with his old Pharaoh.

Soon, after some time of walking, Kaiba could barely make out a blur of a forest not too far ahead of him.

He had long ago seized to stop his futile attempts to climb the steep walls of the vast snow canyon he had fallen into. He had save his remaining energy for the long hike ahead of him, after all.

Kaiba's first reaction when he stepped into the forest's boundary was to nearly lose his balance. The sudden change from fighting against the wind to a still atmosphere was shocking to his senses. Shivering, he craned his neck to study the tall pine trees around him, covered in snow and gently swaying along with the rest of the wind.

Other than a light drift of snow swirling around the trees as the light from the moon made the place glow with a blue hue, the forest was relatively calm and quiet.

Kaiba felt contented for a mere fraction of a second, almost as if he was more than familiar with this place. Where had he seen it before?

But his head was all too soon brought back down to reality by a tug from his neck. "Right, back to business," he muttered, obligingly continuing his aimless stroll straight into the heart of the forest.

The seconds slowly turned into minutes and the minutes slowly turned into an hour or so. "How long...is this...forest?" the brunette wondered, stopping for a bit of rest. Out of habit he glanced at his wrist, recalling that he no longer had a watch.

In all honesty, he would have given up trying to get back to civilization then and there. If it weren't for the fact that he still had Mokuba to live for, he wouldn't have even tried to make it out of that tomb. But...he had someone to live for and couldn't go around trying to give up on life.

Now that struck him as odd. Since when did he start thinking such depressing things about life? Thoughts like that never once strayed across his mind, even for a split second, ever. The boy came to the conclusion that it was probably just the hopelessness of the situation getting to him, nothing to worry about.

To clear his mind, Kaiba took the new addition to his collection out from his pocket. Heraised an eyebrow. "I've been hanging around those weirdos for far too long, new addition to my collection?"

The boyshook his head and brought the golden sphere to his face. His expression going from hopeful to crestfallen.

It didn't show him any visions of the Blue Eye's past incarnation, like it had before.

So bringing the Eye down from his line of sight, he was nearly startled into a heart attack by a figure's abrupt appearance.

A man with beige robes and a turban stared down at him in silent contemplation. "Seto Kaiba?" the man inquired monotonously.

"Who wants to know?" Seto responded rudely.

"I am Shadi, holder of the Millennium Ankh, and guardian of the Pharaoh's tomb," he explained.

"What do I care?"

Shadi seemed undaunted by his harsh tone, almost as if though was used to it by now. He simply responded, "I am aware that you have come to possess the Millennium Eye and must ask for its return, my Pharaoh."

Kaiba scowled and turned his head away. "Too bad, I won it fair and square so you can just take a hike, pal. Besides, you have _me_ confused with someone _else_," he informed.

Shadi's eyes slightly widened. 'So he does not remember? How odd, he already has the Rod, I would have thought he would have regained his memories back by now,' he thought.

"Hey, earth to freak, are you just going to stand there all day or what?" Kaiba snapped peevishly. He had been talking to the spaced out Egyptian and had received no reply.

"Hm, unfortunately you have not changed much over the years, have you?" Shadi countered out of the blue.

"Heard it about a million times today, so save it for someone who cares to hear it, alright? Now, please leave my presence in peace," Kaiba commanded with an air of haughtiness and...royalty.

The turbaned necromancer was now annoyed. An odd feeling, since throughout the millennias he had always been unnervingly patient. Only one particular comrade and Pharaoh had ever been able to grate on his nerves like that. But he had a duty that needed to be dealt with.

"Straying back to the task at hand though, it may be true that you won it under fair rules, but the Item was stolen and therefore does not count as a win." Shadi then extended his right hand out. "The Eye, if you please."

Kaiba hesitated, his eyes darting from the man's hand to the Eye. He had worked too hard just to win the darn thing, now he had to give it away?

Now _that_ was what he called unfair.

But, with much reluctance, he handed the Item over anyway.

"Thank you, your compliance and help in returning the Item is greatly appreciated and will not go unrewarded," Shadi said, placing the golden sphere in one of his robe's pockets. Then, taking an ebony orb out, he handed it to Kaiba. "Here is your prize and heed my warning, it _will_ come of use to you, Pharaoh."

The CEO examined his prize and asked, "What is it...?" but the turbaned man had disappeared as quickly and quietly as he had come.

Kaiba put the small orb away and followed the Ring's directions. "Those Egyptians are really starting to creep me out," he whispered, paranoid that one of them might pop out at any second.

* * *

At the lodge...

Sobbing students were gathered in the lounge, whispering their worries out to their friends. The female gender being the one's doing the most crying and wailing.

"Do you think Kaiba's alright?"

"Poor Bakura."

"I hope Tea's okay."

"No way, Yugi gone?"

"Those three were oddballs, but funny ones at that."

The students continued mourning for their fellow classmates' absences. The Search Department had already given up looking for the students an hour ago.

The main reason for this being that two of their members had gotten severely hurt while searching through the mountains. Other members had fainted from fatigue and others from the cold. Thinking that since their professionals couldn't handle being outside for a short amount of time, then how could a small group of teenagers for a large amount of time?

As the manager of the Search Department walked in, a grim expression etched on his face, he started his speech. "Well, I'm here to, unfortunately, give you all bad news kids," he started off. "Now, as you all know, seven of your fellow classmates have been reported missing for the past three days."

Everyone nodded.

"But we were unable to find any traces of them other than three items. Some of our members were seriously injured and so, I'm sorry to say, that we are assuming that they are dead."

Everything was silent, until more crying aroused, some small sobs here and there.

"We really are sorry, you may go to your rooms now. We'll see if anything new turns up tomorrow," the manager announced shakily.

And so the classdispersed fromthe lounge, slowly making their way back to their rooms when the main doors slammed open, letting gusts of wind and snow in.

"Sweet warmth!" shouted a frost covered Joey.

He andthe othershad previously tackled the door down in a frenzy to get in. The door being locked and the people inside unable to hear them yelling from outside drove them to such an act.

"You traitors! You were just going to go to sleep while we were _right_ outside! We would have frozen our butts off out there!" Joey exclaimed melodramatically, breathing as hard as a raging bull now.

His albino headed friend then whispered, "Weren't we the ones who got ourselves lost? So in a way it was our fault we were out there to begin with."

The blonde turned, his index finger pointing accusingly at the bewildered class behind him. "That isn't the principle of the point. The point is that they don't know that, so what they don't know can't hurt them," he stated in an undertone.

Bakura nodded in understanding, but then stopped, confusion taking over. "Huh?"

Tea shook her head. "Always go along for Joey's sake," she advised, shivering from the cold.

Tristan then joined in, saying, "You should all be ashamed of yourselves! Now, if you'll excuse us, we need to get cleaned up."

"Let that be a lesson to you all!" Joey said haughtily.

Everyone present, besides his best friend, sweat-dropped.

The group of six were then ready to start ascending the stairs, when Ms. Dian came storming down at that exact moment. "What is it? What's all the racket down here?"

Her eyes soon brightened upon noticing her six missing students. Yugi closed the main doors, a loud click indicating it was locked.

"Oh, thank goodness, you're all back! Where were you? What happened? Are you alright?" She looked from one disgruntled face to another and her smile faltered slightly. "One of you is missing. Where is Mr. Kaiba?"

Duke whistled. "See, that's how it all got started," he grinned meekly. "But it's late and we're exhausted, so if this can wait until tomorrow?" he trailed off, the others following him sluggishly to their rooms.

* * *

Kaiba was beginning to fall asleep, he was merely walking out of sheer will. That is, before he tripped over a small heap of snow.

"This just isn't my day!" he shouted in exasperation, ready to pummel the heap of snow until it was flattened like a pancake. But he noticed in time that it was in fact breathing.

'Frosty the Snowman is real, well, now I've seen everything,' he thought sarcastically, inching towards the breathing snow in curiosity.

Dusting a bit of the snow away from what he guessed was the head, Kaiba found a person lying there, deep in slumber. "Well, she's obviously not dead," he murmured, checking her wrist just to make sure her heart was at a normal rate. "Hm, seems fine to me. I wonder how long she's been out here."

Looking at the girl's face closely, he noticed that she was stirring awake.

Her eyes opened a crack as she stared at a silhouette in the clearing above her head. "Feeling alright?" Kaiba asked in mild concern, but the stranger seemed unable to hear him clearly. "Guess not," he sighed, "...come on, let's get going. You need a doctor or something."

And grabbing a backpack not too faraway, which he assumed was the girl's, he managed to hoist the now unconscious girl onto his back. "This is going to be hard, " he gruntedin great pain.

Kaiba then continued his leisurelimping after the source of the Ring's activation.

* * *

Outside...

It might have taken him longer to get there than the others, but he made it, and Kaiba was grateful for at least that.

Shifting the weight on his back, the boy reached the main door to the lodge. But, to his utter dismay, the door was locked.

"What? How can it be _locked?_" he cried, he felt like his head was about to explode with the anger.

Instead he opted for shouting over the wind's howling, only to be drowned out once again. Good thing too because the people he was calling wouldn't have liked a word he was calling them.

"No! I was almost killed by everything imaginable and _this_ is how I'm going to die? By a lousy locked door?" The brunette started pacing around the premises when he caught sight of a window to the left of the main doors.

His trademark smirk flitted across his face.

* * *

Inside in an office...

A woman around her early 40's sat behind her desk, putting some files and a few medical items away.

"Finally, I'm done. Sheesh! Who would have thought that such little cuts would take such an amount of time to bandage up?" Nurse Clare was referring to Yugi and his friends.

It was well past curfew and she was exhausted. "Well, time to head to bed," she yawned, standing up and stretching.

Exiting her office, Clare was passing by the main doors when a loud crash startled her out of her wits.

Everyone was obviously too tired and knocked out to have even heard the breaking glass, plus the winds were probably loud enough to make the corridors sound proof.

'Oh! What if it's a burglar? What do I do?' she thought frantically, staring at the snowy figure who suddenly stood and looked in her direction. She froze in fear as she stuttered, "Please s-sir, there's n-nothing of value h-here."

But the figure ignored her and walked towards her office. "Sir? What a-are you doing?" she asked, trailing behind this person. Then to her horror the snow covered figure looked in her direction again.

The person then coughed, shaking chunks of snow off of his head and shoulders along the way. "You should really leave that door unlocked, I wouldn't have had to resort to breaking through the window if you had." Kaiba shook his head and glared at the nurse. "Well, don't just stand there! Do something! Start the fire, I have an injured girl here!" he shouted.

He was surrounded by incompetents!

Clare was stunned to the point that she didn't know what to do first. "Start the fire first, right," she whispered to herself in a frenzy. She had the fire started in a few seconds then quickly helped Kaiba place the girl down on a sofa.

Grabbinga few supplies from nearby, the woman set to work.

"Where did you find her?" Clare inquired, gaining some of her composure back.

"What does it matter?" Kaiba replied coldly, earning himself a scowl from the older woman.

"Well, it seems that being stuck in the cold and almost dying has just worsened your attitude, young man," she scolded.

Kaiba rolled his eyes. "Thank you for the lecture, _mom_," he said mockingly.

Clare grit her teeth, asking once again, "Where did you find her, Mr. Kaiba?"

"A forest, happy now?"

The nurse snorted, blowing some of her brown hair away from her eyes. "That is very funny, _where_ did you find her?" she asked again.

He gave her a silent reply.

"Sorry to tell you, but there are no forests in the Snow Mountain Resort," the nurse stated.

Kaiba scoffed, "Then you people are obviously blind. Hey! Don't touch me!" he shouted in admonishment.

The nurse was trying toapply some penicillin to his wounds only to have her hand smacked away.

"I'm helping! My goodness, how immature can you children get?" Clare hissed venomously.

"Well thanks, but no thanks. I can do it myself. Now, I'll be leaving her in your care," Kaiba informed, taking the supplies he needed from the nurse's office as he left to his room.

* * *

Three boys bolted upright from their restless slumber. "What was that?" Duke whispered.

They listened closely for any further sounds. "Sounded like breaking glass," Tristan answered, but soon enough shrugged it off. "Maybe we're just hearing things, you know we were pretty shaken by that tomb."

The blonde hid under his covers. "Eeeh, what if it's those creepy crawlers, come back to get us?" he asked. He possibly found an enigma he feared more than ghosts.

Joey quickly got up and went to press his ear against the door, for a while he heard nothing and so somewhat calmed down, hopping back into bed again.

His friends didn't answer his previous question though, and another moment of irritating silence passed as a thought came to Tristan. "Hey, about those creepy crawlers. Remember, when they took Yugi, Bakura, and Kaiba?"

They nodded.

"Well, they tried eating Tea, why didn't they eat or hurt _them_? Yugi said that he and Bakura were just in different chambers, asleep," he finished in suspicion.

This new fact puzzled the three so much that they didn't even hear the footsteps nearing their door until the last minute. "Creepy crawler alert!" they shouted and leapt out of bed to tackle said monster.

"Ow!" someone cried from underneath the trio. "Get off me, you morons!"

The trio blinked and looked down to find their fourth roommate. "Kaiba?"

But Kaiba wasn't in the mood for greetings and roughly shoved them off his back with such force that they collided against each other.

"Hey, watch it! It was just an accident, man!" Tristan rubbed the back of his head.

Seto only stood up, dropped two backpacks onto the floor, and headed for the bathroom with his needed items in hand. A loud slam from the bathroom door was the last they heard from the brunette for the remaining night.

"Seems someone still hasn't learned anything from this experience," Joey said crossly, holding his face in pain, again.

"No kidding, and where has he been anyway?" Duke shook his head and got back into bed. The other two followed suit, moaning in pain from the collision along the way.

* * *

Later in the morning...

"Just wake him up," Yugi told them for the fifth time.

"No way! He'll have our heads for breakfast if we even dare to!"Dukeexclaimed.

"You do it!" Joey directed towards Tea.

"No, you do it!"

The group continued to bicker about who would wake the sleeping boy, whom was under a bunch of blankets. "How about we all do it?" Bakura suggested.

His friends thought it over and found it to be the only solution, but instead of walking forward they found themselves jumping ten feet back. "Bug. Off." Kaiba mumbled grumpily, further burying himself under the covers. "Look you geeks, I'm only going to say this once. Leave me alone."

Tea scowled, pushing her friends forward. "Where did you go after we got out of the tomb?" she asked.

How dare he make them worry, when they shouldn't even have had to in the beginning!

In response, Kaiba incoherently muttered something along the lines of, "Just shut that big trap of yours for once in your life, Gardner." Fortunately for him, considering his injuries and all, she didn't hear him clearly.

It was quiet now, a little too quiet, and Kaiba found himself idly wondering if by any chance his luck took a drastic change and the six had left. But then Joey and the others, minus Yugi and Bakura, started pulling on the brunette's multiple covers.

Unfortunately, they were still there and the squabble continued until they managed to drop him off the bed.

Someone was going to die, Kaiba was going to make sureof that. The geeks were saved from his wrath when the room's door flung open.

Ms. Dian's head then came into view. "What are you kids yelling about...? Mr. Kaiba?" she asked in shock. "When did you get back? Are you alright?"

Her delighted smile widened, suddenly looking sinisterly foreboding. "Well then, now that you're fine, I would like too have a word with you all in my office..._now_," she ordered more sternly.

Yugi and his squad groaned, leaving a disgruntled Kaiba sitting on the floor. He crossed his arms, still clad in his long blue pajamas, and received a murderous glare from Ms. Dian. "Let's go!" she commanded.

"I'm still in my pajamas!" he protested.

"I don't care, you're to blame for waking up so late!"

* * *

In an office on the third floor...

The blonde headed woman gave each an accusing glare. "I am deeply disappointed in you six," she directed to every student other than Joey.

The boyblinked, looking around. "Um, does that mean I'm off the hook?" he asked.

But everyone knew why she hadn't included him in the _intelligent_ department, to put it lightly.

"I gave you specific rules, which I expected you six to maturely follow," the angry teacher ranted.

Joey cleared his throat for the third time, but still went ignored as Ms. Dian began to pace back and forth behind her desk. "_Helloooooo_, all of us includes me, you know? I'm still here, aren't I?"he waved in his seat.

"You had everyone worried sick, I nearly lost my job, and something worse could have happened to you!"

Joey sat there looking steamed, his friends looked ashamed, and Kaiba, well, he was quietly snoozing away.

"You broke numerous rules, and this will not go unpunished! So..., you all have detention for the remaining school year!" Ms. Dian announced.

Her right eye began to twitch. "Get up, young man!" she snarled, waking Kaiba from his dormancy.

Yugi and his friends sighed, glad that detention was their only punishment.

"I'm suing!" the brunette blurted.

"Sorry, care to repeat that? I don't think I heard you correctly," Ms. Dian asked testily.

Now it was war.

Kaiba didn't want to help his rival and his friends, but he was willing go to that length at the moment. "I said, _I'm suing_. You can't give us detention because it was technically your fault we got lost."

"Oh, detention isn't all you're getting. No, no, no, this is also going in your permanent records!"

Tea's eyes widened and she snapped out of her seat. "You can't do that! The academy I'm trying to get into doesn't allow anyone with a bad permanent record in!" she shouted hysterically. Her hard work as a dancer was going to waste if her precious record was ever tainted.

Ms. Dian sighed. "You should have thought of that before you ran off."

Everyone sat there, looking crestfallen, minus Kaiba, who didn't need any record to get him a decent career. Too bad for him though, he owed them and that was one thinghe detested, _owing people._ So this would be the repayment.

"Tell me, who was the one that didn't give me a compass? And who was the one that didn't have an adult in the back, making sure nobody was left behind?"

Ms. Dian didn't answer.

So he continued, "You also mentioned that you were looking for us for two days? We were missing for almost four days! And any one of us can sue for injuries, damage, you know the rest."

His teacher's eyes narrowed. "You're all talk," she countered angrily. Kaiba was well acquainted with the suing business and so was left undaunted.

"Ha! No, you're confusing Wheeler's job with mine. I, unlike him, actually take action on what I say." Kaiba ignored the shout of protest from an indignant Joey.

Ms. Dian turned to the now quiet and meek looking bunch of friends. She asked, "You're just going to sit there and agree with him?"

Tea was not normally one to like petty revenge, but her dreams were hanging on the line. If she had to turn cruel in this case, then so be it. "Well, it's true. This never would have happened if everyone had gotten a compass."

Yugi nodded along with Duke and Tristan. Joeymerely sighed. "Phew! That would have been one too many bad marks, eh Yug?" He gave a laugh, patting Yugi so hard on the back that he was nearly thrown off his seat.

Ms. Dian's glare intensified. "I can't believe you would all sink so low as to lie! Surely you're going to tell the truth, Mr. Ryou?"

The albino boy whistled innocently as he shifted his eyes in every direction but towards her.

"Unbelievable!" She slammed her hand on her desk, although she wanted to continue this arguement, she knew when it was best to retreat before it got ugly. Throwing all their files into the fire, the teacher pointed at the door menacingly. "OUT!"

Literally being thrown out of the room was quite rude, having the door slammed closed in front of their faces didn't make the matter any better either.

But that was the last thing on their minds, as the six friends high fived each other, including Yugi. They thenturned to Kaiba, Yugi holding his hand out. "Thanks for helping, we owe you one!" he said cheerfully.

Kaiba would have said something scornfull and cruel. He would have, but he was just not in the mood today. He would make up for it tomorrow though. The taller boy slapped Yugi's hand away from him and stomped off towards his room, calling over his shoulder, "That still doesn't make us friends."

This surprised no one in the least, but Joey let the comment slide, that time. He had an important agenda in mind right now. And he was going to need Bakura's help in this mission. "Pal of mine, you and I are one in the same, it's time...to eat!" he cheered.

Everyone face faulted.

* * *

Please send all questions, comments, criticisms to the e-mail address on my bio page. Check my bio for update information. Thank you!

Copyright (C) 2004 by Rune-Sorceress. All rights reserved.


	9. Spirits And Amber Eyes

**The High Priest's Secret Tomb**

* * *

**Disclaimer:** I do not own **'Yu-Gi-Oh!'** Kazuki Takahashi, Warner Brothers, 4Kids Entertainment, and etc. does.

**Chapter:** Spirits And Amber Eyes

* * *

That night...

Someone blinked awake, looking at the clock on the opposite wall.

Kaiba silently noted it was 1:45 a.m. Rolling onto his right arm he winced and gingerly touched his left shoulder.

He continued moving uncomfortably, listening to the ticking of the clock. For the past night he had been having horrid nightmares that he was surprised he hadn't awoken yelling and startling the others.

Sometimes he just wondered why he hadn't gone crazy since that night...

Right now he didn't want to sleep, he would just relive that event again. But unfortunately, he drifted off to sleep against his will anyway. Only for a few mere minutes that is, as he was soon startled by the sound of yelling.

Kaiba had half the nerve to shout out as well, looking frantically around the place, thinking they were back. Yet having been disciplined to control himself, he restrained from letting anything slip. Instead he concentrated on his annoying roommates. "What are you chickens yelling about now?"

The trio were hiding under their covers, Tristan being the only one to poke a bit of his head out. "D-didn't you s-see that?" he whispered.

"See what?"

Duke pointed to the doorway which was slightly ajar. "There w-was something or someone in h-here."

Kaiba sighed, these were the people the fate of the world depended upon? They were the ones who saved the world from evil duel monsters and maniacs? Kaiba could only think of one perfect word to describe them: pathetic.

"You're all just seeing things, go back to sleep and stop yelling."

Laying back down, he stayed there for a while until he couldn't take it anymore. "Hasn't anyone ever told you that it's rude to stare at people?" he asked, turning once more to face them.

They were too scared to answer. "I'm warning you three, if this is one of your little jokes..." Kaiba trailed off warningly. They shook their heads vigorously.

Yes, he was positive now that they were most definitely not what you would call _heroic_ material. So now Kaiba ended up doing what needed to be done to help these...nuisances.

"Did any of you catch a glimpse of whatever it was?" he asked, grabbing an emergency flashlight from under his bed.

"It looked like a person, but I don't know, it...didn't at the same time," Duke ended lamely. "You're not going to go are you? Remember they said not to go out after sleeping hours?"

Kaiba didn't answer, just simply stood and walked out the room. "W-wait for us!" the three whispered loudly, also grabbing flashlights along the way.

"Don't make any noise," Seto warned grumpily before Joey dropped his flashlight, a loud thud closely following. Tristan sweat-dropped while Kaiba sent him his infamous glare.

"Oops, hehe, sorry about that." Joey sheepishly scratched his head.

"Butterfingers," Duke muttered.

And the four continued on their journey towards the pitch black staircase, a lone shadow waiting at the bottom. But by the time they reached the bottom step, all they merely caught sight of was a wisp of white hair around the hall's left corner.

Duke frowned. "Um...why would Bakura be taking a midnight stroll in the halls?"

"Hungry?" Tristan supplied.

Joey pondered for a moment as his stomach grumbled. "Maybe he is, could we grab a snack or two along the way too?" he asked hopefully.

Kaiba was too busy to have paid much attention to him. "Later, let's go," he said distractedly.

The blonde silently cheered, but automatically stopped when they came to the stairs which led to the 4th floor of the lodge. "Eeehhh, the kitchen isn't up there! Why is he going up there? The tour guide said it was haunted!" Joey exclaimed, tears pouring down in waterfalls.

"Shhh!" his friends clamped his mouth, his wailing was rising and they knew he was doing it on purpose just to avoid going up there. So Kaiba took the distraction to his advantage and continued on his own.

* * *

Duke groaned. "Okay, where's Kaiba?" he asked his friends.

"What do you mean? He's ri-, never mind. Why does he keep doing that?" Tristan whispered angrily.

"Come on, maybe he went up to chase whoever it was in our room," Joey stated. His friends snickered at his _courage_. Joey was of course oblivious to their laughing, he was just trying to keep his cool.

He wasn't afraid of ghosts, he's faced worse things than this!

There were two halls, two choices. Which way would they go now?

"So then, which way will it be?" asked the blonde.

"Our right," Duke replied confidently. Unfortunately they were headed in the opposite direction of which Kaiba had taken.

"Do you really think it's haunted up here?" Joey whimpered, almost whining like a dog.

"Joe, grow a backbone will you?" his companions sighed.

"What? I was just asking," he defended heatedly, and to show that he wasn't afraid went ahead of them, leading the way down numerous halls.

His companions laughed on, but soonstopped when they discovered that they were back to where they had started.

All three sweat-dropped in embarrassment. "Just great, first the tomb and now the lodge? We're losing it."

* * *

The CEO yawned, squinting his eyes in the dark. He had long ago seized to stop his search for the mysterious figure. Having lost the enigma somewhere around the third hall on the fourth floor and all.

"Where are those dorks, anyway? It's bad enough that I get into trouble because of them to begin with." He turned his head to see if anyone was behind him, but this distracted him from seeing the adult in front of him.

Tapping her foot on the ground, arms crossed over her chest, Nurse Clare cleared her throat to make herself noticed.

"Huh? Oh," Kaiba didn't look all too worried, "...it's only you. By the by, you wouldn't happen to have seen my geeky roommates, would you?"

The woman's piercing gaze indicated a no. "May I ask what you're doing out of bed after curfew hours?" she questioned.

"Ghost hunting," Kaiba replied bluntly before turning serious. "How's that girl doing anyway?"

This sudden curiosity took the nurse by surprise. "Um, she's fine, she'll probably have a bit of the cold for a while. Now," she pointed at the boy, "I want you to gather up your _Ghost Buster_ friends, go back to bed, and go to sleep."

How dare she! His friends? Who in their right mind would befriend those weirdos?

With a huff, Kaiba turned to leave. "One, they _aren't _my friends and two, it's _rude_ to point at people." And with that said, hestomped his way down to the first floor, where he had last left the trio.

* * *

Tristan had to hold Joey at bay because the moment he heard one creaky step the blonde had freaked out.

Coming up the stairs was Kaiba, but Duke didn't know that, and so was getting ready to throw a vase at the person he thought they were chasing.

"Those are priceless vases, you know?" their constantly missing roommate informed.

"Wha-, Kaiba?"

He rolled his eyes. "The nurse said no more _Ghost Buster_ business, so let's go already."

The trio blinked, Joey laughing dumbly at his cowardice. "Oh..., wait a minute. Where did you go and why were you talking to Nurse Clare?" Joey questioned.

Kaiba walked to the second floor before answering, "She was patrolling the halls."

"Did you find the person we were chasing?" Tristan asked.

Kaiba gave them a silent response.

Upon enetering their room, the trio zoomed into their respective beds. Joey complaining out of the blue. "We didn't stop for snacks!"

Someone was going to die right now.

"Will you geeks just shut your traps and go to sleep, already? You'll get food tomorrow morning, so just wait for...four more hours, sheesh! Is it so much to ask for a bit of rest and quiet?" Kaiba growled, glowering at them with a murderous glint in his eyes.

The trio looked wide eyed at the fuming brunette, deciding it better to just stay quiet and go to sleep.

Seto gave them one last glare before tossing his flashlight back in its place and dropping himself onto his bed. Finally getting to rest...

...before the dreams started up again.

* * *

Having finished his breakfast and coffee, Kaiba just sat there, staring idly at the still raging snowstorm from the window beside him. "I wonder when it's going to stop, it's getting on my nerves."

He had been wanting to call his brother for over a day now, to see how he was doing, but the storm was always blocking his signal. Mindlessly tapping his fork against his plate, Kaiba thought back to the day before. "Hmmm, maybe I can go and see how that girl is doing? Hmph! Right, and have her yapping about whatnot none stop? I don't think so," he scorned.

But once curiosity got a hold of its victim there was no stopping its deadly course. "A small visit won't kill me, but it just might bore me to death." So making his decision, he put his dish away in the back of the cafeteria's kitchen and headed for the nurse's office, a single backpack in hand.

* * *

Clare closed a door behind her when she noticed Seto approaching her. "Ah, Mr. Kaiba. The girl is doing fine, if you want to talk to her, go right ahead. She just woke up not too long ago," the nurse informed, walking past him.

Knocking twice on the door he heard a faint, "Come in," and in doing so found the girl sitting in bed. This girl didn't look older than himself, so he automatically assumed she went to his school.

The girl's scowl deepened to some extent, she could already tell she wasn't going to like the guy. True she didn't even know him, she had just met him no less than a second or two ago, but it wasn't like he was going to be any different from the rest of them.

Either way, she would try to be as nice and polite as possible. But even if she did try, that didn't guarantee that she would pull through with it.

Kaiba raised an eyebrow in question, quickly coming to the conclusion that the raven headed girl woke up on the wrong side of the bed today, or maybe it was just the cold taking its toll on her?

"You must be the one who found me, right?" she asked briskly, almost sounding business like.

"That's right," Kaiba mumbled,not one for small talk, unless it were a snide remark directed to a certain group of people he loathed, but seeing as there was nothing else to do at the moment but that, he would try. Really try.

Unfortunately there was nothing he wanted to speak of and so the room stood deafly quiet.

"Don't talk much?" the girl asked, breaking the silence.

"No," he answered simply.

Both crossed their arms over their chests at the same time. Now that was what he called awkward, and that was somethinghe never experienced but on a few occasions, very few.

Again, it was quiet and uncomfortable as she continued glaring him up and down. He was guessing this was the taste of his own medicine.

The girl huffed in annoyance. That was when Kaiba remembered he still clutched her backpack in his right hand and so tossed it at the foot of her bed. He was back to his somewhat composed self once more.

"I found it next to you," he stated.

"Oh, um, thanks," she mumbled moodily.

Honestly, what was this girl's problem? Kaiba found himself thinking in irritation. It wasn't that he was annoyed that she wasn't hanging all over him like all the other...bimbos, for lack of a better word. On the contrary, he was grateful beyond belief that she wasn't, but she reminded him too much of...well, himself, for lack of a better example.

She glanced at Kaiba one more time before shifting her gaze to some other part of the room. "So, where exactly did you find me? I only remember a forest, but the nurse said there weren't any in this area," she said.

Kaiba's right eye was twitching, something that never happened unless he was beyond exasperated. Even the mutt had never reached that level. "Then the crazy lady obviously doesn't know what she's talking about, now does she? You'd have to blinder than a bat to miss that humongous forest,"he muttered.

The stranger yet to announce her name managed to crack a small smile. "Hm, well thanks. Anyway, you don't look like anyone from Shang High, I'm guessing you're from a different school then?" she questioned, a little less formal than before.

"I'm from Domino High," Kaiba answered.

The girl merely nodded, falling dead silent yet again. Her black hair covered a portion of her eyes and porcelain face, making her seem like some evil enigmatic being. Kaiba shook the eerie thought away, he definitely needed to stop letting the geeks' babble get to him. His mind was being tainted with such ridiculous nonsense!

"What's your name?" Kaiba found himself asking out of the blue, just to get that creepy thought out of his head.

"...Yelan Kumiko...and you?"

Kaiba was still eyeing the girl suspiciously, something about her appearance wasn't right. Seto Kaiba was rarely unnerved without good reasons. Where was that Rod when he felt like he needed it the most, anyway?

"Seto Kaiba," he answered with reluctance. Both kept steady gazes on each other.

Yet Kaiba was again beat at his own game and so strove to think of something to shift her attention away from him. "So how did you get lost?"

Yelan's gaze, as he had hoped, strayed away from him. "I was on a hike with my class, I got separated and wandered around into the forest. I didn't have a compass to find my way back so..." she trailed off, he already knew the rest.

"Surprise, surprise." Kaiba rolled his eyes.

She was about to ask what that was supposed to mean, but noticed that he was still standing by the door's entrance instead. She politely gestured to a seat on her right. "Aren't you tired of standing there, you can sit down you know?"

The brunette reclined her kind offer though. "Thanks, but I'm fine just right here."

Yelan gave him a funny look, as if trying to sum him up. "Hey Kaiba, there's a spider hanging behind you," she warned, literally making him go rigid like a statue.

Slowly turning to face the would be ten feet giant spider, he only found one that was barely even half an inch. 'What did you expect?' he scolded himself, glaring at the evil thing.

"Going to burn it to death by glaring at it?" she snickered, not expecting any reply.

"Exactly," he stated, causing her to sweat-drop.

"Come on, you're kidding, right? You're actually afraid of that small thing?" Yelan quipped tediously.

"They just pretend to be small and helpless," Kaiba said, facing her again as the spider scurried away.

"How long were you out in the snow anyway? I think you might have a fever, you're delusional."

"Hm, think what you may, but I won't be fooled," he persisted.

Yelan merely raised an eyebrow in amusement, maybe he wasn't as bad as she had made him out to be.Just slightly...looney. "Chocolate?" she offered, her smile widening a bit more.

"Huh?" Kaiba looked at the piece of chocolate in distaste.

"What? I didn't poison it, if that's what you're thinking, and it's not half bad, considering it's nurse food," she said.

"Very funny, but I'm just not a candy person," he countered.

"Suit yourself, pal."

Kaiba was back to his serious demeanor, staring at her intently. This didn't go unnoticed or unignored by the peeved Yelan though. "What? Think I'm a spider too or something, do you?" she snapped.

Slightly taken aback by her sudden change in mood, Kaiba said, "Hardly, just thought you looked like someone I knew. But...nevermind."

Maybe it was that time of the month for her...he persisted in trying to figure her mood swings out. He was usually so good at this!

Blowing her hair away from her eyes, Kaiba took automatic notice that Yelan had bright amber eyes. They looked almost unnaturally yellow.

"Maybe we met before?" Yelan supplied boredly.

Kaiba was as usual frowning. "Maybe."

"That forest...did you get a good look at it?"

"Huh? Hm, yeah, but why do you care?" he asked, finally realizing why he loathed talking. He never had anything interesting to say.

Yelan shrugged. "No reason, you just looked like you needed help in picking a topic to talk about."

"I don't need help on topics. I have a list full of things I can rant on about for ages."

The boy then thought fast, what were things he could rant about? Well, there were those _fairy-tales_ as told by the geeks. Or there was always the geeks to rant about, yes, that would be perfect.

He would be doing a charitable deed, not only for his sake, but for her's and the world's too.

"Have you ever heard of the geek convention?" he asked. Hopefully she hadn't

A look of insult and fury seemed to cross the girl's face, but she managed to give him a no without exploding. She, often being referred to as a geek, could only sympathize with whoever he was going to insult.

Kaiba though, being the ever perceptive person he was, noticed her sudden change in mood, again. He had half the nerve to strangle her on the spot, but let it slide and decided that he was the one who needed to watch what he said around the her.

Why though? He never cared if he directly or indirectly insulted anyone, ever. Why should he start caring now? Seto inwardly fumed over and over, but he always come to the same answer...

Because he had had an automatic liking towards her since he first found her in the forest.

Yelan was like a replica of him, speaking in attitude terms.

But then again...

"Look," the boy sighed, massaging his temple, "...I'm being as nice as I can be. What is your problem? What's with the attitude problem?" his voice was laced with weariness.

This took her by some surprise. The tip of her tongue was ready with an instinctive retort, but she managed to bite it back. What was so hard about answering that simple question?

The fact that she wasn't entirely sure why she was even angry to begin with either.

"Sorry, just been moody lately, that's all," she opted for apologizing.

He waved in a gesture of dismissal, he was one to talk. Maybe he should learn to take his own advice. Either way, Kaiba inwardly smiled at his luck. "Do you know who Yugi Mutou is...?" he started.

Let the brainwashing commence...

Little did either know that they would be spending day in and day out just talking about anything with each other for the remaining of the 'vacation'.

* * *

"You know what I find weird, but great?" Joey hummed good-naturedly, raising his eyebrows up and down. The others stared at him imploringly, something was off beat about him. "That Kaiba seems to disappear from morning 'till night. Which is more than great, he's keeping his end of his bargain, after all!" he sing-songed.

Bakura looked mildly suspicious. "I see him go into the nurse's office very often these days."

"Oh? That is odd, think he's sick or something?" Duke idly wondered, not really concerned. He was just as happy as Joey with the current peace.

Tristan shrugged, saying, "He looked fine to me just yesterday, although he didn't come back until a few minutes after curfew."

Yugi thought it odd of Kaiba being late for something, even if it was just for a small rule.

'Do you think it has anything to do with his Rod?' Yugi's voice filtered into the dark astral plane.

Yami soon joined him after a moment's silence. _"No...if there were a spirit in that Item, the high priest would have already come out and spoken to us. Don't you think so? After all, he isn't evil,"_ Yami muttered.

'Umm, I...guess. Unless it's not the high priest's spirit in there.'

_"Hmmm, maybe...or maybe Kaiba just needs to take care of his wounds?"_ the Pharaoh supplied.

His counterpart still fretted about the Rod, but tried convincing himself that Yami had the benefit of the doubt. 'It does make sense,' he sighed. 'I just hope it has nothing to do with evil tombs and magic for now...'

Yami nodded his head in understanding. _"Don't worry, I haven't sensed anything as of yet... Ah! Yugi, watch out!"_

"What? Ah!" Yugi's shout was muffled by the thrown pillow in his face.

Tea now held a new pillow in a fencing stance as she challenged, "Ha! Bet I can beat you boys on a five on one battle."

The others looked at each other, knowing it was suicide that they accept her challenge. Joey being the unfortunate one to know that Tea packs a punch when she's on the offense. "You're on!" they accepted their demise confidently anyway.

Tea wasn't one take fighting lightly, even if it was a mere pillow fight.

* * *

That night...

Having had the daylight beat out of them, Kaiba's roommates were now sleeping like three men on their deathbeds. They were lucky they had escaped with their lives.

It was now 1:45 a.m. and again Kaiba could not fall asleep. He felt uneasy and restless, like he had to do something other than rest, even though he felt physically and mentally exhausted.

So now, staring into the nothingness of the dark, his thoughts drifted off to random events throughout his life, including _past_ ones. Unfortunately, his hard concentration was broken by one of Joey's many sudden outbursts, "My food!" before the boy fell dead silent. Or as dead silent as his snores could get.

Kaiba sat up in a miff and glared at the blonde through the thick darkness. He might as well go insane from insomnia because with Wheeler around, he most definitely wasn't going to get any rest for the remaining week.

After a passing moment, the brunette felt that odd hazy sensation again. He felt his body weight lighten before returning to his normal state. But this time...he was no longer in control of his body.

The only difference this time being the fact that he was not slipping into unconsciousness. This time he was the sole witness of his actions.

In disbelief, the brunette saw as he got out of bed and retrieved the Rod from under his pillow, then left the room and down the hall to his right.

'Hey!' Kaiba shouted. 'You dorks, get your lazy butts up and help! ...Useless baboons,' hegrunted as the trio disappeared out of his line of sight. 'I knew this...thing was evil!' he continued to shout, sending the directing Ring a murderous glare.

His body walked across four doors, past the staircase, and brought him down four more doors.

'What, am I supposed to sneak into someone else's room now?' Kaiba thought, unlocking the door with his Rod's dagger.

The boy prowled inside, careful not to make a sound as he advanced on an out cold Yugi. Kaiba felt his grip tighten on the golden metal and his mouth move on its own accord, raising the already unsheathed dagger over his rival's head.

_"Good-bye foolish Pharaoh,"_ someone whispered.

'What?' Kaiba shouted. 'I hate him, but I'm not going to go and kill the poor loser!' With that, he regained control of himself. "Finally!" he clamped his mouth, thankfully no one stirred awake.

_'Take it...'_ a voice that sounded oddly familiar coaxed. The shadows surrounding him seemed to be pulling his hands towards the Pharaoh's Item.

He was losing it.

A long sigh escaped him as he closed the room's door behind him, and all would have gone relatively well if he hadn't noticed he was stepping on a card. "Hey, what's this doing on the floor?" Kaiba pondered, picking it up while backtracking to his room.

The Just Desserts card wasn't a rare card, but it most definitely wasn't a useless one either. Why let such a good card go to waste?

Glowering eyes suddenly snapped open, viewing Kaiba's face from a low angle.

"Hm, this young man should have considered aiding me in my quest, unfortunately for him, he used that talent of his on the wrong person!" the spirit growled.

His scowl deepened as he slunk away, back into the shadows where he belonged...for now. "What goes around, comes around," the albino's smirk returned again. "It is only a matter of time before he receives his _just desserts_."

And then he completely disintegrated into the dark with a malicious laugh.

* * *

A few days later...

The snowstorm had finally resided to a light drift, yet the sky was still a slight shade of gray, making the lodge's halls seem cold and empty. Every student being outside and all.

Only two figures remained inside, slowly walking to the main entrance on the first floor.

"So Kaiba, when is your class leaving back home?" Yelan asked her companion.

"We were supposed to have left two days ago, but the bus ride was postponed until tomorrow."

She smirked. "Why the long face?" she questioned, making him cross his arms.

"Now I'll be stuck with all...these geeks by myself..." he hacked.

Patting his back, Yelan scolded, "One, I warned you that you'd get sick and two, whoever this group is that you keep bashing so harshly can't be that bad."

Kaiba scoffed, "Says the girl who's never met these tyrants." Both stepped outside into the fresh open air.

And then, who better to come down the stairs of the lodge than the one and only, mutt?

Whistling a song to himself, the blonde ridicule of his school cheerily made his way over to the cafeteria. Abruptly stopping only as he caught sight of his rival and...a girl?

'Hmmm? Moneybags, hehe, and a girl! Time for some spying,' he thought gleefully.

Tiptoeing over to the main entrance, Joey poked his head through the slightly ajar door, trying to listen in on the duo's conversation.

Sadly, the two walked away quite some distance, therefore leaving him unable to hear them.

Inwardly laughing at the scoop he was going to tell his friends, Joey opened the door and decided to greet this girl.

Maybe she was in need of dire help from Kaiba's evil clutches!

"Hey Kaiba!" the mutt made his way towards them.

Yelan looked startled, but a look of annoyance merely graced Kaiba's face. Nonetheless, he continued talking, trying in vain to ignore the boy. The girl leaned in close to Seto and muttered, "Is he the one that was choking on his food yesterday?"

The boynodded. "How did you ever guess? ...He's Wheeler, aka, the mutt of the geeks I mentioned before."

Joey waved erratically, a big grin plastered onto his face. He crossed the small distance to them and asked, "Hey Kaiba, who's your girlfriend?"

The brunette ignored him still. "See what I mean? You just feel like strangling the poor loud mouth." Kaiba didn't even bother lowering his voice.

Nodding in agreement, Yelan gave Joey a brief glare. "Looks like a troublemaker to me," she whispered, now seeingher companion'sdislike for the boy.

At the audible insult, Joey's chest puffed out in indignation as he added, "Thought you didn't associate with geeks though."

Obviously this girl wasn't in dire need of saving after all.

Kaiba sent an _'I told you so'_ glance at the girl as he roughly shoved the blonde back inside the lodge, a loud crash following after his departure. "Ignore the brainless one."

Yelan huffed as Mrs. Haiahashi rode up beside them. "Hello there kids, ready to go Ms. Kumiko?" the female instructor asked, holding a helmet out to her.

She was going to bethe one driving the student back to her school's lodge.

Yelan nodded in consent, and the engine was started once more as she took her seat behind the older woman. "Wear something green tomorrow," she smiled before the motor bike took off.

It was then, whenYelan had disappeared into the distance, that Seto noticed something shiny lying on the ground.

Meanwhile, "Ow..., that's it! That's one too many bruises in such a small amount of time!" Joey groaned from inside the lodge.

* * *

Please send all questions, comments, criticisms to the e-mail address on my bio page. Check my bio for update information. Thank you!

Copyright (C) 2004 by Rune-Sorceress. All rights reserved.


	10. Nocturne

**The High Priest's Secret Tomb** **

* * *

**

**Disclaimer:** I do not own **'Yu-Gi-Oh!'** Kazuki Takahashi, Warner Brothers, 4Kids Entertainment, and etc. does.

**Chapter:** Nocturne

* * *

Early in the morning...

Tea yawned. "You three alright?" she asked tiredly. It was six in the morning and everyone, with the exception of Kaiba, was moody and tired.

"What does it look like?" the trio shot back annoyedly. She only rolled her eyes, thinking that they were overreacting about the matter.

Tristan held the ice bag closer to his right arm, tears streaming down his face as he did so. "Did he have to be so harsh?" he asked.

Kaiba meanwhile, was happily whistling away as he passed the group of friends by. Not taking any mind to the glares he received from the trio, he casually stepped onto the school bus. "Jerk," Joey muttered, "...and after we had made a deal with him too!"

Everyone walked onto the school bus, seating themselves as quietly as possible.

"You get to sit next to him!" the raven headed teen told Tristan.

"No way! You sat next to him last time!"

"So? That's because you had to restrain Joey from going berserk!"

Kaiba's roommates were arguing on who _wasn't_ going to sit next to him this time. He grew irritated by the second, not because he was insulted that neither wanted to sit next to him, but by the fact that his peace and quiet was being rudely disrupted. Rising from her seat in the front, Ms. Dian asked, "Is something wrong?"

"I'd like to sit by myself in the back for the rest of the ride," Seto stated bluntly, his teacher shrugged and gave her nod of consent, she wasn't in the mood for arguing today.

* * *

Duke sighed with relief and sat down in the now empty seat. "Thank goodness, ouch!" he winced, putting the ice bag closer to his arm.

"Hmph!" the blonde scoffed. "At least you two didn't get pinched on both arms!"

Yugi turned in his seat and said, "You guys weren't wearing green, you should have known that Kaiba would have found a way to hurt you without getting into trouble, again."

"But you guys weren't wearing anything green either," Tristan pointed out. "What gives?"

At this Tea, who was in the seat in front of Yugi and Bakura, mockingly said, "Because we girls have the special privilege of not getting pinched by a boy on this day."

"Unless we're friends..." Joey added in an undertone, one which the girl could hear perfectly.

"Hm, yeah, but that's if I don't beat you up first," she countered and her friends all laughed nervously.

* * *

At the back of the bus, Kaiba had settled down and was avidly examining the strange item the girl, whom he considered somewhat a friend, had dropped.

The small black pendant with red tresses.

With an air of boredom, he looked out his window and watched the snow drift by somewhat hostilely. He felt more tired than he ever did in his entire life. "What a vacation," he sighed, but quickly shook his head. "But they never did say this was a _vacation_ to begin with anyway."

Dozing off, he idly recalled the nightmare that he had been having for the past few days, but he was too tired and needed rest to even fret about it. With a yawn, he leaned back in the seat and lightly kicked the backpack at his feet.

Something black and shiny rolled out...

"Huh? Oh, I almost forgot about my _prize_," Kaiba mumbled and picked the orb up. "What did he mean by I _would_ need it though?"

* * *

Ding-ding...

"Grandpa, I'm home!" Yugi greeted his grandfather in the living room.

"Ah, Yugi! I missed all of you little rascals! It's been too quiet and lonely without you kids around."

The others laughed. "We missed you too, gramps! Hey, can you believe we had to bunk with crabby pants?" Joey right away started with his ranting again.

Tea huffed. "Don't mind him Mr. Mutou, these three just got the pinching of their lives," she waved dismissively.

Yugi's grandpa sweat-dropped. "It's too bad that you all left so soon. Or you would have been warned beforehand." Mr. Mutou handed his grandson the piece of paper that Ishizu had sent. "It arrived about a week ago so I didn't think you would mind if I opened the package," the aging man responded.

Yugi took the letter and hurriedly scanned through it. "...No way! It's from Ishizu and she...gave the Millennium Scale to you, grandpa?" He stared at his grandfather, who smiled excitedly, and showed all six the golden Scale.

This slightly unnerved them. Why would an old man, who's back could barely support him making any quick movement, receive a Millennium Item?

"What else does it say, Yugi?" Bakura asked, taking a seat on a sofa nearby, the others following suit.

"Um...that she won't be able to keep in contact until November, at the earliest. She also says the Eye is missing..."

"WHAT? Tell us you're joking!" everyone but Duke shouted as tears streamed down their faces at the thought of having to retrieve the Eye again.

"...but it says here that Pegasus doesn't have it. She gave us a warning about...spiders too! And, hehe, to wear something green and avoid Kaiba by all means possible today."

The pinched trio glared daggers at the letter. "Now we get a warning!" they yelled furiously.

"What happened?" Mr. Mutou asked curiously.

But before they could launch into a ranting rage, Bakura stopped them. "Let's start from the beginning first," he suggested good-naturedly.

Yugi's grandpa then smiled slyly. "I have another surprise for you, Yugi," he said, taking out what looked like three Duel Monsters cards from his pocket...

* * *

Finally arriving at his mansion...

Seto Kaiba just wanted to see how his brother was and then go to sleep. "Ugh! It seems as though I weigh like a thousand pounds of lead." Dragging himself towards the door and nearly tripping over his own feet, he was about to turn the knob when the door blasted open. "Ah!" Mokuba latched himself onto his brother in a bear hug.

"You're finally home, good you remembered to put something green on today too!" Mokuba cheered and pulled his brother inside.

"How was your day?" Kaiba began the regular routine of exchanges, a bit dizzy from the fast movement.

"It was boring, you know, without having someone to bug," he grinned as his older brother glared at him. Mokuba had already been informed of the incident on the Snow Mountain Resort and wanted to bombard Seto with multiple questions. One of them was whether he got any snapshots of the tomb. But he knew his brother was probably exhausted and instead asked, "How was your day?"

"Actually, I had my share of fun. Pinching three out of six of the geeks."

Mokuba sighed, wondering if his brother would ever get along with his friends. Halfway through ascending the stairs, Kaiba fell into a coughing fit. "Caught the cold?" Mokuba queried, but his sibling shook his head.

Not heeding his brother's lie, Mokuba pushed him towards his room saying, "You should rest in the meantime, I'll call you when dinner is ready, okay?"

Kaiba rolled his eyes. "Did you finish your homework?"

"No..., but does almost count?"

"No."

"Alright, I'll go finish it, but get some rest," he said and with that the younger sibling ran down the hall to his room.

Entering his own, Kaiba walked to his bed and collapsed, the dark claiming all his senses.

* * *

Monday morning...

Opening his eyes, Kaiba gave a loud cough and groaned at the pain he felt in his throat every time he did. Someone then barged in. "Seto, we're going to be late! What are you doing still in bed?"

Sitting up, the elder made to get up, but his aching muscles forced him to lay back down. "Not...going to school," the brunette grumbled, bringing the cover over his head. Walking up to his brother, Mokuba tugged the cover away and touched his forehead.

"Good idea, you have a fever. Hm, but the maids and butlers have the day off today... I'll stay home then?" The raven headed boy looked hopeful.

Kaiba shook his head though. "Nice try, now hurry up before you're late."

"Who's going to take care of you then?"

"I'm capable of doing things you know? I'm not crippled anymore, but even then I still took care of myself. Now, hurry up and go downstairs to the limo," Kaiba ordered.

Mokuba reluctantly nodded. "Bye Seto," and ran out of the room.

Trying to go back to sleep for an hour or so was a hard task for the ill boy. Instead he opted to stand up and headed to his bathroom, thinking there was maybe medicine in there.

But when he stepped into the bathroom he was startled by the mirror to his left side. Kaiba could practically feel the shard digging into his left shoulder's skin again. He shook the horrid sensation away, and went in search of his medicine, but found nothing of the like.

That was when he heard it, something or someone was downstairs.

The shuffling of a door being opened and shutting closed rang throughout the mansion. For a while the teen stayed quiet and still, then he moved to his bedroom and dialed a number on his cell phone. "Mokuba better have gone to school," he mumbled.

_"Hello?"_ his brother whispered from the other end.

"Mokuba?"

_"Hey Seto, something wrong?"_ his brother asked in worry. Kaiba was quiet for a moment, too quiet for his brother's comfort. _"You still there, Seto?"_

"Where are you?" Kaiba queried as he grabbed his Rod, quietly opening his bedroom's door.

_"In school, why? You know I'm not supposed to be on the phone at school."_

"Right, sorry about that. It's nothing, nevermind, good luck on your history test."

_"Thanks, see you after school then,"_ Mokuba said and hung up. The annoying beeping deadline then rang through Kaiba's ear.

Kaiba let a small sigh out, a migraine was coming on, and he cautiously made his way down the hall.

Coming to a stop on the top of the second floor staircase, he scanned the bottom floor. 'The security systems should have alerted me before the intruder even broke in through the premises,' the boy reasoned as his eyes narrowed.

A vase dropped to the ground on one of the top floors at that precise moment.

Making his way up instead, Kaiba looked around a corner on the third floor and spotted someone's shadow walking up a small staircase that lead to the fourth floor.

Kaiba hesitated for a moment as he remembered, 'That floor has all of _Gozaburo's_ things, why didn't I ever get rid of it all?' The boy anxiously stepped forward, but then turned back around, and yet again decided to go forward.

What was there to be afraid of?

That man was as good as dead, now.

Catching sight of a wisp of white hair round a corner, he quietly followed. The feeling of being watched again slightly stiffened his light steps, but he ignored it as best as possible.

As Kaiba came to a halt, he unsheathed the dagger the Rod hid and swung open the only door in that hall.

It was a study, cases full of books covered almost every inch of the walls and stacks of random books piled up into small heaps. "Never did bother to clean this room," Kaiba gave a short huff.

Looking over and around the stacks of books scattered everywhere, he found no one. His fists tightened as he thought back to the lodge with the ghost hunt they had late one night, it was always strands of white hair he last saw.

Who could it be?

Turning around, Kaiba gave one last look over his shoulder before leaving, but it was then that he noticed that there was no door in front of him.

Looking all around himself, Kaiba saw that there were no walls, and no floor or ceiling for that matter. It was all pitch black. Just books that looked as if they were levitating along side with him.

This seemed eerily familiar to him and his eyes narrowed in remembrance. "That realm that Akunadin took me to," he whispered.

_"Close enough,"_ a voice echoed from out of nowhere.

Seto blinked. "That sounded like...me? Who's there? And please be so kind as to actually answer me for once!" he demanded.

Someone tapped him on his shoulder and quickly looking behind him, Kaiba restrained from attacking. The boy glared at the figure and asked, "Another mirror image, right?"

His almost mirror like counterpart shook his head, crossing his arms as he spoke, _"No, I am you. I thought you were smarter than that."_

Seto couldn't believe it, this guy actually had the nerve to come into his house and try to imitate him? The last time that happened he couldn't do anything about it, for he was far from Duelist Kingdom Island to do so. But then another thought came into mind.

"Let me take a wild guess," Kaiba began, "...you're one of those weird, evil, possessing spirits that those losers are always talking about, no?"

The other him seemed to have ignored this remark as he corrected, _"Yes and no. I am a spirit, but not an evil, possessing one."_

Kaiba tapped a foot in impatience as he glowered at the spirit. "Surely this is one of either Yugi's or Ishtar's little mind games. Maybe if I just close my eyes you'll go away," his voice was dripping with malice. Of course the teen knew better than that by now. "Get out of my house now!" Kaiba ordered.

His other only gave him a shake of his head. _"We must first come to terms if you wish me to leave this place,"_ the spirit informed.

The CEO looked ready to kill, sure the man was slightly taller by an inch or two and he looked much stronger than him, but that never stopped Kaiba before and it most certainly wouldn't now.

The spirit was adorned in his usual clothes which consisted of blue and golden robes, a blue headset with a golden snake which sat on his head, and a white cape.

"I'm not coming to any terms with _you_, whoever you are."

The other sighed. _"I only ask one thing of you and in return I shall repay you."_

Seto grew more impatient the longer he stayed in this 'Shadow Realm' as the geek squad called it. "Go...on," he coughed.

_"Well,"_ the other began, _"...I will be needing your assistance in a ritual I wish to perform. Your reward shall be in the teachings of the Old Arts."_

Kaiba only looked mildly interested though. "Old Arts? What on earth is that supposed to be? Because if it's lessons on history..." the boy warned menacingly.

_"It is_ magic_, as you call it."_

Now Kaiba looked skeptical, not to mention exasperated, there really was no way to enlighten the young man's mood. "You're that priest I saw with that Blue Eyes girl. Set, Seth, Seto? I really couldn't catch much from where I was standing," he stated tediously, although he seemed a bit more curious on the matter as he remembered the Blue Eyes girl and what she had told him when he met her.

Again, the spirit corrected him, _"It is high priest Seto, but to avoid confusion, just call me Seto and I will call you Kaiba. It is quite an insult being called after an evil God, after all."_

"You're that person always talking in my head, aren't you?" Kaiba accused, his glare returning full force. Seto nodded nonchalantly. "So when we're done, you'll leave me alone," he stated.

It wasn't a matter of debating a yes or a no.

_"Of course,"_ Seto replied.

Contemplating it over, Kaiba found much to be gained from this proposition. 'Except that will mean more work for me to do,' he thought grudgingly. And after much consideration he replied, "It depends on what I have to do."

Seto was expecting this and so walked over to a stack of books. The spirit skimmed a hand down to the middle of the pile and pulled a book out. _"You will be studying from this one book and then we shall test how you do on the summonings in the end,"_ Seto informed.

The teen glanced at the book which the spirit was holding out and read: "Millennium Spell Book." Looking at the Millennium Rod still gripped in his right hand, he hesitated a little longer before shrugging. "It's worth my peace of mind," Kaiba agreed, accepting the book.

With a swift wave of his hand, Seto transported both of themselves out of the Shadow Realm. _"I will return in a few days time so we may begin,"_ he informed and disappeared with a slight bow as a thank you.

Yawning, Kaiba walked out of the room and down to his bedroom at a very sluggish pace. He glared at the book in his hands with all his might, willing it to set on fire. He would have put up more of an argument, really he would have, but he knew better by now.

The High Priest, known as Seto, would have just kept insisting, like the rest of the Egyptian people he had encountered in such little time.

So, for the sake of saving time and getting it done with already, he would go along with this little charade.

* * *

Two weeks later...

"Hey, Yug? Has gramps heard of this cool new shop that's in Domino for the month?" Joey asked the boy walking next to him. Yugi shook his head. "Is he going to throw a fit when he does," the blonde laughed.

The group of friends entered their first class as everyone thought back to when Duke first came to Domino City.

"Look guys, Kaiba finally came to school," Tristan pointed to a desk in the far back corner of the room, closest to the window.

Yugi fidgeted in growing worry, he could see something different about the boy, besides the fact that his hair was unusually unruly today.

Could this be what he had been dreading since the moment he had handed him the Rod? Motioning for the others to follow his lead, they walked up to Kaiba's desk. "Hey there Kaiba! Why haven't you been to school for so long?" the cheerful boy asked.

Kaiba gave them a dull glance and simply answered, "Sick..." before turning to look out the window once more.

But that was too vague of an answer for the group and so Tea further probed. "Sick for two whole weeks? That's only when you have the flu or something," she gave him a skeptical look.

Bakura nodded. "You look as if you've just traveled through the Shadow Realm and back," he commented, only meaning it as a joke. Having been there at least twice the boy would know what he was talking about.

Kaiba snorted. "I had the cold, now if you don't mind." He tried swatting them away by swinging out a book he had been reading a while ago.

But this was one of those open opportunities Joey just loved to take advantage of. "What's wrong moneybags? Can't handle a small cold?" At this the brunette immediately gave him a warning glare.

The rest of the group sighed, "Here we go again." But...the retort never came as Kaiba decided to ignore Joey and just went back to looking out the window. "Huh?" they blinked in surprise.

Kaiba then added, "Be happy that you haven't gotten on my nerves as much lately mutt, or you'd find yourself in a worse heap of trouble than usual."

This as usual had a big effect on the blonde, as did any and every insult, be it a little one or a big one. He tried in vain to claw his way towards the brunette, but was dragged to the other side of the class, where their seats were located at, by his friends.

"Well, we're glad you're feeling better, Kaiba!" Yugi smiled from across the room, but Kaiba didn't seem to have heard.

Yami had been overhearing the small conversation and was a bit unsettled. _"What do you think he means?"_ the spirit asked, appearing next to Yugi.

The teen shrugged. 'Hm, I don't know, he sounded like his regular self to me.'

Yami frowned, he could have promised that, for the slightest second, Kaiba had glared _directly_ at him just then. _"I still have that lingering feeling something bad is going to happen..."_ he stated warily.

His vessel only shrugged it off as he said, 'Kaiba is just being...well, Kaiba.'

Yami waited a few moments before residing back into the Puzzle, contemplating something he had remembered. The group finally seated themselves as the rest of the class piled in. _"Yugi, I have something important to talk to you about. We'll talk back at the shop, alright?"_ Yami's voice echoed from the Puzzle.

Yugi looked baffled, but nodded anyway. 'Sure, first thing when my friends leave,' he replied.

And that ended their talk as Ms. Dian started class. "Mr. Kaiba, note please..."

* * *

Late that night in the Game Shop...

Yugi hopped onto his bed and waited for the Spirit of the Puzzle to come out. Then appearing beside his bedside stand, Yugi noticed that Yami had a much more serious expression on than usual.

"So, what was it you wanted to talk about?" Yugi immediately started off.

The spirit pondered on how to put the words just right for a while. _"Well, I never did have much time to tell you about my past. What with all the duel preparations and everything, correct?"_ he said.

Yugi nodded.

_"You already know the basics, I was Pharaoh, Kaiba was one of six priests as well as Ishizu, Shadi, and so on?"_

"Yeah, your point being...?"

The spirit sighed. _"Remember the duel on Alcatraz Tower with Kaiba was supposed to be the exact way it was 5, 000 years ago?"_ He received another nod from his counterpart. _"Well, it didn't go exactly as 5, 000 years ago."_

Yugi looked disbelievingly at Yami and shakily asked, "What? You mean we were supposed to lose in that duel?"

Yami nodded. _"When I faced him in my memories, he defeated my Dark Magician with his Blue Eyes and he would have killed me off, but it seemed as if though he were being possessed,"_ he stated.

"So..., that means we still have yet to have the _real_ battle with Kaiba?"

_"Yes, and I'm afraid we lose, Yugi,"_ the spirit informed, now deeply worried.

"But, you said Kaiba was being possessed, w-what set him free from the spell?" Yugi queried desperately.

Yami was at a loss for words there.

A minute or two passed by as the two tried to find some kind of flaw in this new predicament of theirs. In the end though, it proved to be futile.

_"We should finish this talk with the others tomorrow,"_ Yami suggested, his counterpart silently agreed.

Yugi fell into an uneasy sleep that night. Neither knew when Kaiba would snap and activate his full powers. This what he had been dreading all along then.

* * *

At the Kaiba residence...

Kaiba quietly flipped through an old book in the middle of the night.

_"The mirrors are a small reflection of the Shadow Realm...and you can never rid of the shadows."_

The boy tapped his chin and continued on to the next passage.

_"The mirrors are a small reflection of the Shadow Realm...and you can never rid of the shadows."_

He tried to concentrate, but those words rolled through his mind to end. They were distracting him from his work.

Still trying to ignore the irritation of this phrase, the brunette continued studying for another three good hours.

When Kaiba had first looked through the pages of the old book he had not been surprised to see that he could indeed read the ancient text at all.

As for Seto, he had come back a few days after their first encounter. The spirit still would not tell him of his plans though, he would only comment on the fact that it was a real shame that his reincarnation didn't even know what a tarot card was.

So they were starting from the beginning, much to the spirit's impatience.

Kaiba was constantly being drilled on the different types of magics there were, that the spirit knew of, and of all the names of the tarot cards. It was only the first two weeks of his studies and the boy was already exasperated. But Kaiba endured the lessons only because he wanted to know more about who this Kisara girl was.

Finishing the last of his reading for that day, Kaiba put the book under his bed and left to his home office to finish a few last modifications on his latest project. But as he exited the room someone was keeping a close watch on him.

Disappearing back into the dark, the albino gave one last glare at the Kaiba manor, vowing to return with a vengeance.

* * *

A few miles away from Domino City...

A serene looking house sat in the distance, the garden around the house full of pink and blue flowers.

The flowers were really the only things that gave the place a flare of life, balancing out the sad air that the willow tree in the backyard seemed to radiate. The oddest part about the scene was not how the house or its premises looked like though. It was the fact that there was even a garden at all, and to top it all off that it looked as if it were well taken care of.

It really was a wonder why the flowers did not die already to anyone who passed by. Because it was supposedly said that no one had lived there for more than over six years.

A dead feeling seemed to hang over the house, even the weeping willow seemed sadder than usual.

The interior of the house was moldy as dust lay on every touchable surface. Furniture sat in every room, so surely _someone_ must be living there.

Forever untouched...or so someone _thought_ the house would stay that way, yet nothing is ever left hidden.

Something dark lay sealed within the houses boundary, but even then it did not mean that it would stay sealed. Its power had grown over the past six years and it was ready to expand into the houses outer boundaries.

Shadows danced around the houses every corner, almost as if waiting for the right moment to strike. The dark leered its forever watching eyes out for any sign of prey that might be wondering about the place.

It had to eat sometime...

In a room the silver framed mirror, that plagued someone's mind to no end every night, sat against a wall. Looking harmless and like the most beautiful thing ever created, as usual.

A picture, consisting of a family of four, was taped securely onto the mirror's edge...

The moonlight that filtered into the room from the outside of the balcony door's curtains bounced off a certain relaxing glow, yet a sense of discomfort and burdening somehow reverberated all around.

_"The mirrors are a small reflection of the Shadow Realm...and you can never rid of the shadows."_

The smell of something dead reeked in the air...

* * *

_To Be Continued..._ **_Silent Shadows_** **_

* * *

_****_Thank You To:_**

**Setosbluedragon-** _(To begin, big thanks for reviewing! Glad you found it somewhat enjoying.)_

**FeelaG101-** _(Thanks for taking the time to review and sorry about accidentally erasing your review. I had no idea I would do that if I deleted the story. I had been fiddling around with the site, you know, to get the hang of how it worked, hehe.)_

**yamiseto'sgrl-** _(My favorite reviewer! Many thanks for reading all the chapters to this. As for the girl, you'll see who she is if you plan on sticking around for the fourth part of my series. Now that is a long way from here. Anyway, hope to hear from you in the sequel.)_

**DarkDaisyKillr-** _(Hmmm, I'm not sure what you meant by that, but I'm taking it as a compliment. Thanks for reviewing.)_

**someone-** _(Happy to hear you liked it, hope you drop a remark again.)_

**ShadowFire2-** _(Great advice, never would have thought I'd change my mind about the paragraphing. But as the days passed by and I looked at my work, I was even having a hard time telling who was saying what. I bet it's much clearer now. Thank you!)_

**Darkness-** _(You're right, it is. Sorry about the confusion though, but that just means you know how the squad felt. Review again!)_

**mariko-** _(You guessed right on one of the voices, by now you know the other was Akunadin. Again, pleased to hear good comments!)_

**Voldermort's Daughter-** _(Thanks and come by for the next story if you can or want.)_

**Setoglomper-** _(You're too kind. -starry eyed mode- But not to worry, there will be a sequel, plus the story will be continued on for quite some time. It'll definitely seem like forever. I'm guessing maybe a six series story, maybe even seven. Review again!)_

**Seto-sama Kaiba-** _(Very touched by your words. Hm, the advice you gave me was true, so I fixed it up. I already have two reviews stating this, so there's obviously a problem in the dialogue department. Thank you for reviewing and hope to hear from you in the sequel.)_

**Broken Arrow-** _(I hope I got your name right, this too got deleted, as did the e-mailed version Anyway, I remember you said that Bakura caught your attention in the summary and that you wanted to see more of him in the story, right? Well, how did you like it? Don't worry, he'll be back!)_

**?-** _(Again, another reviewer that got deleted, as did the e-mailed version. For starters, I'm sorry I didn't even remember your name! Very sorry, but I think I remember what you said in your review. You guessed correctly, the person with the blue eyes was Kisara. Hope you review again, I'll print it right away this time!)_

**Added Reviewers**

**Shadowfrost Panther-** _(Now there's an interesting fact I didn't know, I'll have to figure a way out to fix that up in the next part. Thank you for the review and the information too!)_

**Evilseto-** _(Glad the choppy work didn't bother you. I wrote to you like you asked, but I don't know if you received it. Hm, either way, you can write to me through my bio address if you wish. Drop by again!)_

**Readers Who Don't/Haven't Reviewed-** _(Thanks for taking the time to finish reading this story and hope all of you liked it. Even though some don't like to review, I know there are a lot of people who read it, and either liked it or hated it. Maybe I'll hear from some of you in the coming stories!)_

* * *

Please send all questions, comments, criticisms to the e-mail address on my bio page. Check my bio for update information. Thank you! 

Copyright (C) 2004 by Rune-Sorceress. All rights reserved.


End file.
